THE BIBLE
UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM
A REVIEW OF CURRENT EVOLUTION THEORIES
ABOUT THE OLD TESTAMENT.
^ BY THE
REV. E. H.' DEWART, D.D.
TORONTO:
WILLIAM BRIGGS,
Wesley Buildings.
Montreal: C. W. COAXES. Halifax: S. F. HUESTIS.
1900.'
JO // //
Entered according to Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year one
thousand eight hundred and ninety-nine, by William Brioob, at the
Department of Agriculture.
PREFACE.
I VENTURE to think that this book sufficiently manifests
the purpose with which it has been written, to require no
lengthy preface. My main object is to correct some
current misapprehensions respecting critics and criticism,
and to show, in plain and popular language, that most of
the distinguishing theories of the advanced "Higher
Critics '' are not justified by adequate proof.
The chief conclusions of this critical school are stated,
and reasons given for rejecting them ; but many secondary
points in this controversy have been left unnoticed. If
the main positions of these critics are shown to be unten-
able, their views on subordinate points cannot possess any
great importance.
Although a cumulative strength of argument and proof
will be made evident by reading successively, in the order
in which the topics are treated, yet, as each chapter deals
with one phase of the general subject, any chapter may be
read by itself without serious disadvantage.
It will be seen that the critical contest is not, as is often
assumed, between "scholars" on the one side, and un-
learned " traditionalists " who blindly cling to the beliefs
of the past on the other; but between critics who have
adopted the evolutional theory of the origin of the Old
Testament, and equally learned biblical scholars who
IV PREFACE.
refuse to accept the negative theories of this " Higher
Criticism ; " but who advocate and practise the freest
criticism of the Sacred Writings.
I have no disposition to cling to the opinions of the
past, as if they were undoubted verities. At the same
time, I am as little disposed to follow leaders who
speak as if the great thinkers of the past were slaves
to authority, and the conception of the Bible and its
truths which inspired the godly faith and zeal of former
times, was so erroneous that it must be thrown aside like
a worn-out garment, to make way for speculative theories
which have not been tested by time. The fact of a
belief about the Bible being traditional does not prove it
to be indubitably true ; but certainly it should not dis-
credit any belief, that it has been generally held by Chris-
tians in the past.
I have not written this volume with any thought of
opposing the free criticism of the Bible ; but with an
humble hope that, in spite of my imperfect treatment of
the subject, the facts and arguments submitted, and
especially the judgments of eminent conservative scholars,
may be the means of preventing unprejudiced readers from
accepting unverified theories about the Old Testament,
which tend to weaken and undermine faith in the truth
and Divine authority of the Holy Scriptures.
E. H. D.
Toronto, November, 1899.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS ON SOME CURRENT PHASES
OF THE QUESTION.
PAOB
A Time of Critical Enquiry— Questions that Require Definite
Answers— Different Estimates of Critical Results— Vague
Pleading for Liberty of Thought-A Questionable Prac-
tice—Incorrect Assumptions Regarding the Position of
Conservative Theologians-Fair Consideration Should be
Given to Facts and Arguments 9
CHAPTER II.
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE CAN JUDGE THE
THEORIES OF THE "HIGHER CRITICS."
Undue Exaltation of Partial Experts-The Appeal is to
Reason and Attested Facts-The Judgment of English
Scholars not to be Discarded— Statements of Hebrew
Scholars on this Point-The Cause of Different Inter-
pretations of Isaiah liii.— Intelligent Conviction the
Ground of Belief-No Disparagement of Biblical Learning 24
CHAPTER III.
WHAT IS THE "HIGHER CRITICISM" OF THE BIBLE?
Need of Right Views of What is Meant-Definitions of Higher
Criticism-Classification Depends on Conclusions Adopted
—The Pentateuchal Controversy— Astruc and His Succes-
sors-Theories of Higher Critics-The Logical Results-
Arguments Against Disintegration 3g
VI CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV.
CONSERVATIVE BIBLICAL SCHOLARS AND FREE
CRITICISM.
PAOR
Free Criticism a Sacred Right— Orthodox Scholars Advocate
this— Young Ministers Should Read Both Sides— Objec-
tions not Based on Prejudice — Critical Principles and
Facts Accepted by Conservative Critics 57
CHAPTER V.
THEORIES BUILT ON IMAGINARY STATES OF LITERARY
AND RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE.
Making History Fit a Scheme— An Unjustifiable Way of
Fixing Dates — Archaeology Contradicts the Higher Critics
— Accounts in Genesis not Babylonian — Import of Recent
Discoveries not Recognized 73
CHAPTER VI.
UNWARRANTED CONCLUSIONS BASED ON ALLEGED
SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE.
Partial Statements of Higher Critics — Neglect of Mosaic Laws
Accounted For — Historians and Prophets Refer to Penta-
teuchal History and Rites — Conclusive Testimony of
Amos, Hosea and Later Prophets— The Facts not Fairly
Met by the Higher Critics 92
CHAPTER VII.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS OF HIGHER CRITICS-" THE
CANONIZATION OF CONJECTURE."
Miscalled Scientific Criticism— A Preconceived Theory of
Evolution Determines Conclusions — Theories Built on
Mere Conjecture — VVellhausen on the Chronicles — Gra-
tuitous Creation of Redactors — Thoughts Suggested by
These Methods— Adverse Statements of Biblical Scholars 115
• •
CONTENTS. Vll
CHAPTER VIII.
CONTRADICTORY DIFFERENCES OF PROMINENT HIGHER
CRITICS.
PAOB
The Contradictory Differences Not Insignificant — Examples
of Wide Difierences as to Dates — Differences Relate to
tlie Same Kind of Questions which Constitute the Main
Elements of Higher Criticism — Reasons for Distrust .... 147
CHAPTER IX.
THE BEARING OF CURRENT THEORIES ON OUR LORDS
TEACHING AND CHARACTER.
Christ's Testimony to the Old Testament— New Testament
Conception of Messianic Prediction and Fulfilment — Our
Lord's Citation of the 110th Psalm— Three Theories
Examined— The modem "Kenosis" Discrowns Christ —
His Teaching Not Disproved— Making Room for Ration-
alist Theories 158
CHAPTER X.
EFFECT OF THE EVOLUTION THEORY ON FAITH IN THE
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES.
Statements of Higher Critics— Not Merely Literary Questions
—Theories which Affect Confidence in the Divine
Authority of Scripture— Harmful Effects on Christian
Faith ir. Europe -The Plea for "Christian Scholars"
Examined— Following Anti-Supernatural Leaders— Tes-
timony of Eminent Biblical Scholars on this Question ... 173
CHAPTER XL
CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS.
Re-statement of Facts and Arguments in Previous Chapters
—Many Critical Conclusions Unreasonable— Advantages
of the Analytic Criticism Unduly Magnified— Prof. W. J.
Beecher on the " Books " and the " Sources "—No Moral
Power Gained by Dissecting the Books 202
THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER
CRITICISM.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS ON SOME
CURRENT PHASES OF THE QUESTION
A Time of Critical Enijuiry — Questions that Require Definite
Answers — Different Estimates of Critical Results — Vague
Pleadings for Liberty of Thought — A Questionable Practice
— Incorrect Assumptions Regarding the Position of Con-
servative Theologians — Fair Consideration Should be Given
to Facts and Arguments.
IN these times of searching enquiry and mental
unrest, nothing is too sacred to be criticised.
The questioning critical spirit invades every depart-
ment of human thought. We need not therefore be
surprised that the Sacred Scriptures have been sub-
jected to the same close critical scrutiny that has
been exercised in other spheres of enquiry. But the
peculiar claim of the Bible to be a book containing
divine revelations of truth, invests the results of
Biblical criticism with exceptional importance. In
most Christian communities a notable interest is
manifested in what is commonly called the " higher
9
10 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
criticism " of the Old Testament. Many who have
not had the opportunity of examining the subject for
themselves are anxious to know in what degree these
modern critical theories affect the historic faith of the
Christian Church, in the divine inspiration and
authority of the Holy Scriptures.
Many are asking such questions as these : What is
the "higher criticism" ? What changes in the historic
Chri::tian view of the Bible would the acceptance of
these new theories involve ? Are there any valid objec-
tions to the methods and conclusions of these critics ?
Would the general acceptance of the new theories about
the Old Testament tend to promote spiritual religion ?
Is it true that all Hebrew scholars now accept the
idea that the Old Testament is the product of
evolution, rather than an authentic account of God's
dealings with Israel, and a record of divine revela-
tions made to chosen men, who " spake from God
being moved by the Hoi}'' Ghost " ? Are the argu-
ments, for and against this evolution theory of the
Scriptures, such as intelligent English scholars can
understand, so as to judge for themselves as to what
is true and right ?
The significance of these questionings is very much
intensified by the great differences of opinion, respect-
ing the value of the results of the " higher criticism "
of the books of the Old Testament, which distinguish
the views of the advocates and opponents of the
advanced theories. The former esteem the conclu-
sions of this modern criticism a great gain to the
Christian world, by which errors and misconceptions
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 11
of the past have been corrected, and the origin and
character of the Hebrew Scriptures set in their true
light.
But many eminent biblical scholars, though freely
admitting the value of the light shed by modern
study on the history and times of the books of the
Bible, regard many of the conclusions of the advanced
critics as speculative conjectures, not sustained by
adequate proof, and strongly tending to undermine
faith in the trustworthiness and divine authority of
the Holy Scriptures. It is important to know which
of these judgments is right, or whether there is any
safe middle ground between the extreme views of
these conflicting schools of thought.
There are several things which make a plain state-
ment of some of the main facts bearing on these ques-
tions neither untimely nor unnecessary at the present
time. There is no scarcity of books and articles in
reviews and magazines discussing this subject. The
literature of biblical criticism is abundant enough ;
but the great majority of Christian people have
neither the time nor opportunity to read these
elaborate and technical works.
Besides, unverified conclusions are asserted with
the most positive and oracular confidence, as if there
was no room for any contrary opinion. Partial state-
ments are made respecting the actual state of the
controversy, that would " lead astray, if possible, even
the elecL." Sometimes opinions, that are still warmly
disputed by competent scholars, are stated in a plausi-
ble paraphrase, as if they were unquestioned historic
12 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
facts ; or, at any rate, as if those who do not accept
that version of the matter might be counted out, as
unworthy of any consideration. There are also signs
of a tendency to show less reverence for the Bible
than formerly. The words of inspired Apostles are
sometimes set aside with an air of superior wisdom,
when they do not accord with some modern critical
opinion. This is a serious and suggestive fact.
In former times our forefathers heard or read of
lax theories about the Bible being held in Germany,
or France, or somewhere else, as something that did
not greatly concern them. These things then seemed
far off, and, above all, they had strong confidence that
the personal experience of salvation in the heart
would keep the head free from heresy and error in
religious belief. But the wave of critical speculation
has reached all the Protestant churches of Britain
and America. It cannot be rolled back by any voice
of authority. It must be squarely met by appropri-
ate facts and arguments.
There are signs that of the younger ministers, who
desire to keep abreast with the religious thought of
the times, some liave been smitten by the attraction
of views that confidently claim to be the outcome of
liberal thought and modern scholarship. Many of
this class are without anything like a thorough
knowledge of the issues at stake, or the strength of
the objections which eminent biblical scholars, who
do not accept the theory that the Scriptures are the
product of evolution, have urged against the guess-
work of the advanced critics.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 13
Undoubtedly there are difficulties and apparent
contradictions in these ancient writings; but these
difficulties have been greatly exaggerated In view
of the remoteness of the time when they were written,
the limited literature in the language, and the fact
that Hebrew has long ceased to be a living language,
it would be strange if this were not so. But we may
admit the difficulty of reconciling two statements,
without accepting a theory of different authors of
different dates which is built upon it. Modern criti-
cism has indeed suggested explanations which would
lessen some of these difficulties. It is, however, the
judgment of many biblical scholars that the views by
which the " higher critics " claim to have solved many
of these critical problems create greater difficulties
than those they remove.
It is an admonitory fact that all past efforts to
conform Christianity to systems of secular philosophy
have resulted in robbing it of its spiritual power.
Nor is it without significance, that German radical
criticism of the Old Testament mainly originated in
an effort to conform the conception of the Scrip-
tures to the pantheistic philosophy of Hegel. It is
truly said by Prof. F. R. Beattie, " that much of the
modern criticism, which ignores the supernatural and
seeks to give a naturalistic explanation of the religion
of the sacred Scriptures, has grown out of the soil of
the idealistic Pantheism of Heo:el." The srravest
problem suggested by this modern critical scheme is
to determine whether the main theory of the evolu-
tionary critics, and the conception of the Bible it
14 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
loj^ically implies, can be accepted without seriously
a,fFec.'ing those beliefs and religious experiences, that
have been the vital forces of Christianity in every
age of its history.
There is at the present time a good deal of pleading
for free enquiry and progress in theological thougiit,
which has special significance. It is deemed dis-
creditable not to agree with the new theories about
the Bible, and an evidence of superiority to accept
them. Liberty of thought is sacred ; but there is no
necessary antagonism between freedom of thought
and the acceptance of duly attested truths. The
value of liberty depends upon the use we make of it.
The right of freedom of thought is now so universally
acknowledged that it stands in need of no defence.
But freedom of thought does not mean that any one
who advocates new theories must be exempt from
criticism or refutation. Those who condemn all
creeds have an unwritten, if not a written, creed of
their own. It does not mean that adverse criticism
of opinions we believe to be erroneous should be
stigmatized as intolerance and persecution. It does
not mean that the Church should not maintain purity
of teaching in her ministry, without being charged
with " heresy-hunting."
Whenever a preacher or teacher is criticised or cen-
sured as teaching views that are unscriptural and
erroneous, a clamour is raised without much regard
to the issues, that the man is not allowed liberty of
thought and is being persecuted for thinking for him-
self. This is generally a false alarm. The issue is
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 15
not, shall such a man have liberty to believe what he
deems right? No one wpnts to deprive him of that
right. The real question is, If we are convinr.d that
a man has accepted beliefs that are false and un-
scriptural, shall we authorize and employ him to pro-
pagate these misleading views as if we believed them
to be true ? Neither churches nor individuals should
be recreant to their conviction as to what is true and
right, nor indifferent towards what they believe to be
erroneous. It is a spurious liberality that speaks as
if one opinion was as right as another. This is
virtually ignoring the distinction between truth and
falsehood, and by implication denying that the Holy
Scriptures are a standard of religious truth by which
beliefs should be tested.
We may fully agree with the strongest things that
can be said in favor of freedom of opinion, the
sacredness of truth, and the right of new ideas to
receive fair consideration, and yet feel it to be our
duty to reject the particular views these liberal senti-
ments are used to cover and excuse. When some
doubtful views are being publicly advocated and
taught, general pleadings for liberty of belief in
teaching have a significance they would not possess
under other circumstances. At such a time pleas for
liberty and liberality may be equivalent to an allega-
tion, that all who reject the new views are opposed
to free and independent criticism. This is confound-
ing things which differ. Eloquent declamation about
freedom of thought, love of truth, and the necessity
of keeping abreast of the progressive learning of the
16 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
times, may be employed to justify and apologize for
what is erroneous as well as in defence of what is
sound and true.
When any teacher of men speaks as if theologians
of the past did not grapple with the great problems
of religious thought independently, and as if these
questions were now in a state of flux requiring scien-
tific adjustment, it is pretty certain that he is trying
to make room for some ideas of his own Hence,
when we hear fervid pleadings for new ideas and the
results of modern thought, and disparagement of all
that we have received from the thinkers of the past,
it is in order to ask those who adopt that style to
come out of the clouds of indefinite generalities, and
to tell us plainly what historic beliefs we are required
to give up and what new beliefs we should substitute
for them. It is not a commendable thing to cover
doubtful dogmas with high-sounding generalities, that
conceal rather than express what is meant. Those
who have any new views to teach should have the
honesty to state them plainly. When this is done,
the supreme question to be met and answered is :
" Are these opinions or theories true and proved
BY adequate evidence ? "
It has become a rather common practice, with some
who have not fully committed themselves to the con-
clusions of the advanced critics, to portray as favor-
ably as possible how much that is good and valuable in
religion would be left us, even if the negative criticism
be accepted. In other words, to make out how little
harm it would do Christians to accept these new
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 17
critical views. This phase of the subject wiP be dis-
cussed in a future chapter ; but I may say in this
connection, that I regard this as a questionable prac-
tice. For, though we should be slow to pronounce
dogmatically what the consequences of accepting a
new theory sliall be, yet, as the truth or falsehood of
any teaching is the main thing, this should be settled
before we determine our attitude towards any new
views of the Bible. It is paying too much deference
to speculative analytical critics to adopt, even as a
working basis, the idea that we have nothing of the
Bible left that is trustworthy, but what their partial
criticism permits them to concede. There are many
examples of men having begun by theorizing in this
way, and ending by accepting the opinions for which
their theorizing had prepared the way. This method
has too much the appearance of preparing to sur-
render, by making the people familiar beforehand
with the idea of adjusting themselves to the new
theories. Picturing what the religious position of those
who now possess peace through believing might be,
after they have renounced the confidence in the trust-
worthiness of the Bible which has inspired and
sustained their faith in the past, is too much like
describing to people who have eaten and are full how
well they could do, if reduced to a starvation allow-
ance of food.
A remarkable illustration of this practice is seen in
a book by Prof. A. B. Bruce, which he entitled
" Apologetics." At one point he says : " It will be
time enough to dogmatise when criticism has arrived
2
18 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
at the stage of finality. It is far enough from hav-
ing reached that stage yet. Not to mention endless
diversity of views on special points, there are broad
contrasts between different schools, even with refer-
ence to the leading critical problems."^
And yet his whole work is on the line of these
unsettled theories. He is ready to surrender the
historic conception of the Scriptures at almost every
point. He constantly quotes the rationalist critics as
his main authorities. His *' Apologetics " is really an
apology for the theories of the " higher critics." It
sometimes seems as if this method of building with
confessedly " untempered mortar " was adopted be-
cause it is thought less likely to repel those whom it
is desired to influence, than an outspoken approval
of the evolution theory of the origin of the Hebrew
Scriptures.
Some writers have a practice of ascribing question-
able opinions to those who refuse to accept their
theories ; as if all who do not think just as they do
were shut up to the acceptance of some weak unten-
able views, which require no refutation. One form
of this is seen in the undue disparagement of the
theologians and methods of the past. A recent
writer describing the way in which former trans-
lators found an answer to the question, " What is the
true text?" says : "Whenever the enquiry arose as to
what any writer of sacred Scripture said in a parti-
cular place, the tendency of the theory was to insist
that he "inust have said thus and so, and to fix in this
* "Apologetics," p. 171.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 19
way whatever form of the text seemed most favorable
to the theory itself." One is prompted to ask, what
translators of the past would accept this as a truthful
characterisation of their work ? The theory which
denies all predictive reference to the historic Christ
is, forsooth, called the " Ethical Theory " — as if those
who deny the negative views do not fully hold and
teach the moral and religious lessons of Hebrew pro-
phecy. There is no just ground for any such assump-
tion. It is contrary to the facts.
It is too much the fashion for those who advocate
the evolutional theory of the Bible to represent all
who do not accept that view as timid traditionalists,
who base their beliefs on the authority of theologians
of the past, while the " higher critics " are to be
respectfully regarded as having obtained their views
by personal study and examination. The actual facts
do not justify this assumption. As that able scholar.
Prof. James Robertson, of Glasgow, says : " The
critical theory is fast becoming traditional, and is
accepted by multitudes on no better grounds than
those on which the former view became traditional."
Prof. W. J. Beecher says, referring to the analytic
critics : " They have no right to claim that they differ
from their opponents in that their views are based on
investigation, while those of their opponents are based
on tradition." Both the negative and conservative
schools have in their ranks those whose beliefs about
the Bible are based on personal study and examination ;
but both have also many who have accepted their
beliefs because they had been the beliefs of others.
20 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
It is not too much to aay, that ordinary Christians
who hold the ortliodox belief about the authorship of
the books of the Bible have as good ground to be
credited witli independence, as persons of similar
learning who accept the theories of the higher
criticism, on the authority of certain critics. The
latter class accept theories that are based on subtle
distinctions and speculations, whose import they but
imperfectly understand. 'J'he former hold the historic
view simply because they accept the Bible as being
what, on the face of it, it assumes to be.
We certainly should have some better reason for
our belief than tliat it has been held by others, either
in the past or in the present. But some writers seem
to think it a sufficient reply to any objection urged
against the radical theories, to say that it is on con-
servative or traditional lines of thought. As if it
were enough to discredit any view that it was the
faith of the Church through the ages of the past ! If
any theologians or churches in the past have held a
theory of inspiration, or any other traditional belief
which cannot be justified by a sober scientific study
of the Bible itself, it should not be assumed that this
questionable view is held by those who reject theories
which divest the Bible of distinguishing (|ualities,
which are in a large degree reasons for accepting its
teaching as a standard of faith and duty. It is as
futile as it is unjust to cite exploded notions of past
times which no one now holds, such as that the
Hebrew vowel points were inspired, that Moses wrote
the account of his own death, or some fabulous Jewish
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 21
legends about tlic Hebrew 8crij)tures, as if such tliinjijs
represented the behefsof tliose wlio reject tlie tlieories
of the higher critics of Germany.
In the discussion of these (questions whicli so closely
touch our estimate of the Bible, I do not postulate
any theory of the inspiration or inerrancy of the
Scriptures, except what they claim or assume for
themselves. I do not (juestion any man's right to
the most searching examination of the contents of
the books of the Bible. But I claim an et^ual right
to reject what I deem untrue. I feel bound to
"earnestly contend for the faith which was once
delivered unto the saints ; " but I hold no brief for
the defence of every traditional belief. I feel no
obligation to accept what has been held by good and
gifted men of the past, any further than it is sup-
ported by Scripture and sound reason. No opinion
is accepted because it is old, or rejected because it is
new. Neither novelty nor antiquity can be safely
taken as a test of the truth of any teaching. " What-
soever THINGS ARE TRUE" — these and these only
should be accepted by lovers of truth.
I lay no claim to be a critical expert ; but my
whole life has been given to literary and biblical
studies. I have considered with open mind the argu-
ments of the advocates of the " hio;her criticism " and
the counter criticism of their opponents. I ask no
one to accept any conclusion on my authority ; but I
would remind those who may differ from me, that if
pertinent and important facts are correctly stated,
and conclusions supported by fair and valid argu-
22 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
ments, it is an evaHion, und no proper reply, to try to
break tlie force of .such factH and arguments by tlie
authority of " all scholars," or the alleged learning
and love for the Bible of certain critics who hold
different opinions. This method of answering objec-
tions has been too much in evidence of late. We are
not dealing with the sincerity or conscientiousness of
critics, but with the truth and soundness of their
teaching and the validity of their arguments. The
rejection and refutation of a man's opinions should
not be construed as aspersing his character.
In view of all that has been written on the subject,
there is not much room for new arguments. I have
freel}'- availed myself of what others have written.
The numerous quotations from able and learned con-
servative scholars, which will be found in this volume,
are the chief elements of value in the work. Yet, I
would remind my readers that, though these judg-
ments of learned men are weighty and valuable, they
are not cited as unquestionable oracles, but for their
force and reasonableness, and the help they give to a
right understanding of the important questions under
consideration. They disprove the common assump-
tion that " all scholars " accept the negative theories.
One thing is certain, we are passing through a
grave crisis. The Old Testament is "under fire."
Essentially rationalist teaching about the books of
the Bible is current in the theological literature of
the day. It is advocated by men of distinguished
learning, and received in unexpected quarters within
the Christian churches. There is therefore great
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 18
need to discriminate between conjectures and facts —
between plausible surmises an»l valid arj^uments.
We should accept whatever is fairly proved by ade-
quate evidence, and reject what is disproved or is
open to valid objections. We should withhold accept-
ance from conjectural j^uesses that are not supported
by proper proof, or that from the nature of the case
can never be conclusively decided. Truth always
suffers when men decide without the necessary data.
What is said in this volume to show that there are
cogent objections to many of the methods and con-
clusions of leading " higher critics," should not be
construed as a condemnation of thorough and inde-
pendent biblical criticism. I mean no indiscriminate
condemnation of all higher critics. " There are critics
and critics." I simply mean to show that many cu''-
rent assumptions of leading critics, which strongly
tend to overthrow faith in the trustworthiness and
divine authority of the Holy Scriptures, are not sup-
ported by adequate evidence and are advocated by
unscientific and unwarrantable methods.
CHAPTER 11.
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE
CAN JUDGE THE THEORIES OF THE
''HIGHER CRITICSr
Undue Exaltation of Partial Experts — The Appeal is to Reason
and Attested Facts — The Judgment of English Scholars
not to be Discarded — Statements of Hebrew Scholars on
this Point — The Cause of Diflferent Interpretations of
Isaiah liii. — Intelligent Conviction the Ground of Belief —
No Disparagement of Biblical Learning.
IS it justifiable to assume, as is frequently done in
curren*: discussion, that this subject of the autlien-
ticity of the books of the Bible is beyond the compre-
hension of ordinary mortals, and that they must accept
on trust what claims to be " results of modern criti-
cism ?" It seems as if some writers would have us
believe that we have no choice between accepting
theories that are essentially rationalistic, or admitting
the force of infidel objections against the inspiration
of the Holy Scriptures. We are not shut up to either
of these alternatives. We cannot consent to strip the
Bible of those characteristics which distinguish it from
all other writings, in order to evade the force of skep-
tical objections to its divine authority. This question
must be settled before we go any further ; for if in-
24
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 25
telligent readers of the English Bible are incapable of
understanding the questions at issue, it would be of
no use to proceed with the discussion of the subject.
It is somewhat strange that those who pose as the
champions of independent thought, and seem to think
they have a mission to break the chains of authority
imposed by the Church of the past, should be so con-
stantly appealing to the authority of "all scholars"
and " the consensus of modern critics " to settle vital
(questions affecting our estimate of the Holy Scrip-
tures, The unquestioning acceptance of the theories
of modern critics is no more laudable than submission
to the canonized authorities of the past. There may
be quite as much independence and love of truth in
*' earnestly contending for the faith which was once
delivered unto the saints " as in pliantly bowing down
to the authority of critical experts, in order to be
abreast with modern critical learning. It is well to
keep in mind, whatever the learning or ability of any
writer may be, that " there is only so much force
IN ANY man's opinions AS THERE IS FORCE IN THE
REASONS FOR THEM."
No one should expect to settle such grave questions
by dogmatic assertions, or appeals to the opinions of
" scholars," however eminent they may be. It may
be that, if we knew who were meant by the " Christ-
ian scholars " appealed to, we would know enough
about them to regard them as unsafe leaders. Facts
may be established by the testimony of competent
witnesses, but the truth of opinions and inferences
cannot be established by the prestige of distinguished
26 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
names, " Great men are not always wise." All the
heresies that have corrupted the truth were introduced
by men of learning. Baur and the leaders of the
Tubingen heresy were as famous scholars and as popu-
lar for a time as the greatest of the " higher critics "
of the present day.
The reader of the English Bible should not give up
his right to think and judge for himself. Neither
should the minister, who is not an expert Hebrew
scholar, regard all these questions as exclusively be-
longing to expert linguists. Intelligent English readers
are not left to the tender mercies of rationalist critics,
with nothing but the resources of their own wits to
meet the negative theories. The results of the studies
of the most eminent scholars are within easy reach of
all who desire to study them. So in all ages Christ-
ians have used successfully the weapons for the defence
of the truth, that had been forged by the gifted leaders
in the Church of God.
All who are at all familiar with what has been
written by the most learned writers on this subject,
both advanced and conservati >'e, know that the main
questions are submitted to the reason and common-
sense of all intelligent Christian readers. If there are
writers who think these to be matters which none but
Oriental scholars can understand, why do they appeal
to the general Christian public as they do ? They
cannot expect their theories to be accepted with un-
questioning faith on their authority alone. Writers
who make their appeal to intelligent English readers,
if these readers consider the evidence for the new views
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 27
insufficient and reject them, should not contemn the
jury as incompetent because the verdict is unfavorable
to them. Yet, in Germany and also in America, it is
too much the fashion to treat the objections of Christ-
ian pastors and intelligent laymen as of no account,
and to regard all these questions as the special preroga-
tive of college professors of the analytic school of
critics. It looks as if readers of the English Bible
may be conceded intelligence enough to accept these
critical theories, but not enough to reject them intel-
ligently ; or, rather, that acceptance of the critical
theories is made the test of intelligence, and their
rejection an evidence of incompetence.
As the results of accepting the new conception of
the Bible profoundly concerns the whole Chrip+ian
Church, thoughtful men and women are not likely to
give up their intelligent convictions in deference to
claims of superior scholarship. They will require
something more than the assertion of partial advo-
cates, that certain theories are supported by "the
ripest German scholarship," before they accept them
as true. There is truth and common-sense in the
remark of Dean Chadwick, of Ireland, that " plenty
of orthodox clergymen, and laymen, too, who have
not the slightest notion of rejecting anything that
can be really proved, have just as little intention of
letting go their old beliefs, unless the case is really
made out to their satisfaction."^ To treat with con-
tempt intelligent English scholars who cannot accept
the views of ** higher critics," as if it was an imper-
^ Expositor, November, 1889.
28 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
tinence for such persons to have any opinion on the
matter, is virtually to deny their right to judge for
themselves, and to assume that they should accept
the new theories without an intelligent conviction of
their truth.
It is now freely admitted by the greatest Hebrew
scholars, that intelligent readers of the English Bible
can understand and judge the characteristic conclu-
sions of the " higher critics." The ultimate decision
of the main questions in dispute must rest with the
enlightened Christian consciousness of the people,
rather than with partial critical theorists. A few
quotations from distinguished Old Testament scholars,
advanced as well as conservative, will show that the
assumption that these questions are beyond the com-
prehension of English readers is not regarded as true
or scientific by those who are the most competent to
pronounce on this point.
Principal Cave, of Hackney College, in his able
work on the Inspiration of the Old Testament, says :
" It may be fearlessly asserted that the original words
of the Old Testament are sufficiently known to us for
the purpose in view, no future suggestion of textual
criticism being capable of interfering to any material
extent with the general conclusions which will be
arrived at. . . . No one would have the temerity
to maintain nowadays that valid opinions upon the
general bearings of the Old Testament are impossible,
either on the score of the corruptness of our copies, or
on the score of the precariousness of our translation.
In fact, we might almost rest satisfied with the Re-
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 29
vised English Version everywhere, without going far
astray." -
The main arguments of the advanced critics are
not based on special translations. Speaking of the
alleged double authorship of Isaiah, Prof. T. K.Cheyne,
one of the advanced higher critics, says : " My own
opinion is, that the peculiar expressions of the latter
prophecies are, on the whole, not such as to necessi-
tate a different linguistic stage from the historical
Isaiah; and that, consequently, the decision of the
critical question will mainly depend on other than
purely linguistic considerations."^
In his masterly work, " The Early Religion of
Israel," Dr. James Robertson, Professor of Oriental
Languages in the University of Glasgow, says : " In
the following chapters an attempt is made to approach
the subject in such a manner that an intelligent
reader of the English Bible may not be placed at a
disadvantage, and to present the questions in dispute
in such a shape that he will be able from the first to
follow the argument."*
Even the late Professor Robertson Smith, speaking
of the English edition of Wellhausen's " Prologomena
of the History of Israel," says that the work " gives
the English reader, for the first time, an opportunity
to form his own judgment on questions which are
within the scope of anyone who reads the English
Bible carefully, and is able to think clearly and with-
out prejudice about its contents."^
2 Page 27.
3 " The Prophecies of Isaiah," p. 240.
* Page 5. * Page 6.
30 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
A similar position is taken by the late Professor
Kuenen himself, the great high priest of rationalist
" higher criticism." He says : " The Bible is in every
one's hand. The critic has no other Bible than the
public. He does not profess to have any other docu-
ments inaccessible to the laity, nor does he profess to
see anything in the Bible that the ordinary reader
cannot see. It is true that here and there he improves
the common translation ; but this is the exception, not
the rule. And yet he dares to form a conception of
Israel's religious development totally different from
that which, as anyone may see, is set forth in the Old
Testament, and to sketch the primitive Christianity
in lines which even the acutest reader cannot recog-
nise in the New."^
That distinguished Hebrew scholar, the late Prof.
A. McCaul, of King's College, London, speaking of the
right understanding of the historic facts of the Old
Testament, says : " In such matters no reader of the
authorized version ought to allow himself to be
mystified or silenced by an appeal to foreign critics,
much less to be disturbed in his faith, as if he could
not apprehend the general teaching of the Bible with-
out profound knowledge of the Semitic dialects and
the latest results of German criticism."^
Even so advanced a critic as Professor Ladd, of
Yale College, does not regard these questions about
the Bible as the exclusive province of Hebrew scholars.
He says : " It is the common experience and comm,on
" Modern Review, July, 1880.
'"Prophecy," page 98.
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 31
judgment of Christians to which the appeal must be
taken. And just as far as we separate the arguments
for any view of the nature of the Bible from those con-
siderations which commend themselves to the judg-
ment of all alike, just so far do we remove the
advantages of the practical use of the Bible from the
reach of a large portion of mankidn."^
In such statements by such writers there is ample
justification for submitting these questions for the con-
sideration of English scholars.
Everyone will admit that the correct translation of
the original, and the finer shades of meaning, can only
be given by those who have mastered the language in
which these Scriptures were written. But when the
textual critics have done their work, and given a
correct rendering of the original into English, the in-
telligent reader can judge as to the soundness of the
conclusions that are based upon the meaning and
established facts.
The questions at issue between conservative scholars
and advanced critics only rarely relate to the meaning
of the text; but in almost every case turn upon
inferences drawn from a meaning and facts accepted
by both parties. The different views of the Scriptures
that are held and taught, do not result from differ-
ences in the scholarship of commentators ; but from the
spirit and beliefs with which they come to the study
of the sacred writings.
The expositions of the 53rd of Isaiah furnish a
good illustration in point. There is no material
•" What is the Bible?" page 10.
32 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
difference about the meaning. There is general agree-
ment as to what is said by the prophet about tlie
mysterious sufferer. The late Dr. Edersheim, of
Oxford, says : " There is no fundamental divergence
between Jew and Christian as regards the translation
of this chapter." As Dr. Pusey says : " The question
is not what is the picture ? On this all are agreed ;
but whose image or likeness does it bear ? " The
exegesis of the passage does not tell us who is the
person here spoken of. We can only know this by
finding who f ultilled what is said of the suffering ser-
vant. When the Eunuch's question is asked : " Of
whom speaketh the prophet this ? of himself or of
some other"? the intelligent English scholar can judge
as to what being in the world's history fulfdled these
prophetic descriptions as well as the Hebrew linguist.
Rationalist critics, who come to the study of this
wonderful prophecy predisposed to ignore or deny
supernatural prediction and real fulfilment, and
modern Jews, for a different reason, apply it to a
personified Israel or one of the prophets. But Chris-
tian scholars, who believe that the Spirit " testified
beforehand " to the prophets " the sufferings of Christ
and the glories that should follow them," and who
accept the testimony of Christ and His apostles to
this great truth, are convinced that the Prophet is here
speaking predictively of " Him of whom Moses in the
law and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth."
Such eminent Hebrew scholars as Delitzsch, Orelli,
Edersheim, Cave, Wunsch, Urwick, Oehler, Dr. A.
McCaul, and others scarcely less famous, hold that the
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 33
prophecy speaks of a person, predicts the future
Messiah, and was fulfilled by the events of the life and
death of the Lord Jesus Christ, as recorded in the
New Testament.
It is not the difference in their linguistic learning
which makes these two classes of critics differ as to
who is spoken of in this prophecy. It is their different
beliefs respecting prophecy and fulfilment. The
critic who asserts that an individual is not spoken of
here, and that it does not refer to the Messiah, does
not get this opinion by his superior learning, but by
adopting beforehand a negative theory, which compels
him to deny that the Prophet is foretelling "the
sufferings of Christ and the glories that should follow
them."
So far from it being true that arguments for and
against the higher criticism can only be understood
by linguists, they are more within the capacity of the
intelligent English reader than the work of the
textual critic. The translations of the latter he must
take on trust ; but the speculations of the former he
can bring to the tribunal of his reason and common-
sense. He cannot dispute about the meaning of a
Hebrew text, or the soundness of a critical analysis,
but he can judge whether the inferences drawn from
specified facts are sound and reasonable or not. Argu-
ments which cannot be stated in plain English and
understood by intelligent readers, are too slight and
fanciful to bear the weight of the theories, that we
are asked to accept as results of so-called " scientific "
criticism. The issues involved are too grave to be
3
34 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
decided on any authority, short of an intelligent
personal conviction of the truth of the conclusions we
accept. Here, as in every other case, we should
"prove all things, hold fast that which is good."
There can be no intelligent faith without convincing
evidence of the truth of what is believed. As John
Milton, in his famous " Areopagitica," forcibly says :
" A man may be a heretic in the truth ; and if he
believes things only because his pastor says so or the
assembly so determines, without knowing other
reason, though his belief be true, yet the very truth
he holds becomes his heresy."
Every intelligent Protestant believes he can give
good reasons why he is not a Roman Catholic. But
the questions at issue between Protestants and Roman
Catholics are quite as difficult and abstruse as the
questions : Was the coming and suffering of Jesus
Christ predicted by the Old Testament prophets ?
Does the New Testament contain an account of events
that are declared to be a fulfilment of these prophetic
predictions ? Is the new critical theory of the origin
of the Old Testament in accord with the conception
of the sacred writers themselves ? Can the New
Testament conception of the Old Testament be
rejected, without undermining faith in the inspira-
tion and authority of the Christian Scriptures ?
These seem to us questions within the province of
all thoughtful readers of the English Bible. Yet it is
assumed by some that they can be answered only by
Hebrew experts. Nay, more, that the Church must
go to the experts to find out what her ministers may
STUDENTS OF THE ENGLISH lUliLE. 35
preach and teach on these points. But Christians
should no more accept a belief about the Bible on the
authority of another's word, than they would accept
a doctrine of the faith on such personal authority. It
has been truly said : " The qualifications of the spe-
cialist render him peculiarly prone to push a theory
at all hazards, when to common-sense it appears
manifestly overweighted." (Robertson.)
In making these observations respecting the claims
of critics and the rights of English readers, I have no
thought of disparaging the value and importance of
biblical learning. The Church and the world are pro-
foundly indebted to Christian scholars for the trans-
lation, exposition, and defence of the Bible. The
learned labors of these men have bequeathed to the
world inestimable legacies of exposition that have
greatly promoted an intelligent faith. Not the least
of these is the able vindication of the authenticity and
trustworthiness of the Scriptures, against the theories
of the evolutionary critics. We should be willing to
accept all duly attested facts. But when conjectural
inferences and imaginary history are offered for belief,
as if they were historic facts, on the authority of
"higher" critics, every intelligent reader of the English
Bible has a right to demand a satisfactory verification
of the truth of what he is asked to accept as " results
of scientific criticism." Without such verification no
theory should be accepted.
CHAPTER III.
IVHA T IS THE " HIGHER CRITICISM " OE
THE BIBLE ?
Need of Right Views of What i.s Meant — Dofinitiona of Higher
Criticism — ^Classitication Depends on Conclusions Adopted
— The Pentateuchal Controversy— Astruc and his Succes-
sors — Theories of Higher Critics — The Logical Results —
Arguments Against Disintegration.
IT is necessary to have a clear and definite idea of
the distinguishing features of the higher criti-
cism of the Bible, in order to judge of the reasonable-
ness of its conclusions, and to rightly estimate the
value of the arguments by which its theories are
supported or condemned. These critical studies are
mainly confined to the examination of the internal
evidence, which the books of the Old Testament
present regarding their authorship, the dates of their
composition, their trustworthiness, and the occasion
and purpose of their being written.
Since the invention of the term " higher criticism "
by J. G. Eichhorn, of Gottingen, it has been used by
some writers to distinguish this kind of criticism from
the study of the words of the text. Not that inferences,
as to the times and authorship of the books, are any
higher or more important than the settlement of the
86
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 37
correctness of tlic text, on wliicli «'ill tlieories and ex-
positions nuistbo founded. Tliis is too essential a work
to be regarded as a " lower" kind of criticism. As
Principal Cave says : " The * higher ' criticism docs not
mean the * superior criticism,' though many seem to
think it does. The ' higher ' critics do not mean the
better critics, as if they were gifted with a sort of
genius in criticism."
Of course, it is freely admitted that the power of
sifting and weighingevidence, and of balancing proba-
bilities, one against the other, must be possessed by
those who would succeed in ohese critical studies.
The absence of those (jualifications is sure to cause
failure, no matter what linguistic learning the critic
may possess. A few definitions of higher criticism
by distinguished biblical scholars may assist the
reader in getting a right conception of its import.
Professor Zenos, of Chicago, defines higher criticism
in general as *' the discovery and verification of the
facts of literary productions, on the basis of their
internal characteristics and contents."
Prof. A. H. Sayce, of Oxford, says : " By the
' higher criticism ' is meant a critical enquiry into
tlie nature, origin, and dates of the documents with
which we are dealing, as well as into the historical
value and credibility of the statements which they
contain." ^
Principal Cave says : " As regards its nature the
highier criticism is nothing but an examination
of the language and contents of the books of the
^" Higher Criticism and the Monuments," page 2.
38 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Bible, with a view to determine when they were
written, and by whom they were written, and how
far wliat is written is valuable — more briefly to
determine their age, authors and reliableness.""
Prof. C, A. Briggs says : " Having secured the best
text of the writings, criticism devotes itself to the
higher task of considering them as to integrity,
authenticity, literary form, and reliability. This is
appropriately called higher criticism."^
Prof. Francis Brown, well known as an American ad-
vanced critic, says : " Higher criticism deals with the
human element in the Bible, and with that under cer-
tain aspects only. It has to do simply and only with
the literary problems furnished in the Bible. It aims
to learn the structure and authorship of the different
books, to study the literary form of the Bible as
distinguished from other biblical matters."*
Dr. Brown's ccflnition seems to us too narrow. A
true criticism .'ould embrace the study of every
feature of the Bible. If there is a divine element in
the Bible it should not be ignored. Besides, a good
deal depends on who is to determine what is human
and what is divine ? By Dr. Brown's method the
human element may be so unduly magnified and the
divine so completely omitted, as practically to amount
to eliminating the divine element from the Book. As
a matter of fact, in the work of the leading " higher "
critics there is generally no definite recognition of the
divine and spiritual elements in the Bible, which are
2" Battle of the Standpoints," p. 8.
3" Biblical Study," p. 96.
* Homiletic Eevieiv, April, 1892.
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 39
its crowning distinction. The " literary problems "
of a work really embrace every characteristic feature
of it ; and our study of the Bible should include the
inspiration of its writers, if we believe there is proof
of their inspiration.
Prof. Howard Osgood has shown, at length, in the
Bihllotheca Sacra for October, 1892, that the majority
of German scholars do not accept the division into
" lower " and " higher " criticism. Each author gener-
ally makes a classification to suit himself. Schlier-
macher called it " a mechanical and untenable dis-
tinction." A. Sabatier says : " There are two sorts of
criticism, of words and of facts, which have often
been improperly divided into lower and higher
criticism." But certain British and American critics
use the term, as Dr. Osgood says, " as though it meant
something scientifically definite, and were the highest
possible reach of scientific exegesis." This is simply
designating their speculations by a high-sounding
name which, in many cases, the result does not justify.
Apart from the extreme play given in recent times
to the use of conjecture, the higher criticism is not a
new thing. The name is newer than the thing
signified. It is virtually the same as what was
formerly called the study of the genuineness and
authenticity of the Holy Scriptures. We have a good
example of this method in past times in Paley's " Horse
Paulinae," which shows that the undesigned coinci-
dences between St. Paul's Epistles and the Acts of
the Apostles attest the authenticity of both. Also in
Bentley's criticism of the Epistles of Phalaris this
method was successfully used.
40 TFIE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
It is unjustifiable to talk as if some special method
of biblical study had been discovered by German
critics, which if only followed by Bible students would
secure infallible results. There is no royal road to
right conclusions. More depends upon the character
of the man than upon any system of study. The
philosophy and theological standpoint of the critic are
generally more potent factors in determiiiing his con-
clusions than any so-called " scientific " method of
biblical study. Critics, like cooks, may use the same
materials and professedly follow the same methods,
and yet produce very different results.
It is easy enough to define higher criticism, as a
method of biblical study, in general terms to which
few would object. The difficulty is in designating
and classifying the results of such studies. Equally
learned, gifted, and sincere students of the Bible have
drawn widely different inferences from the same
Scripture records. The classification of these writers
must be determined by what they teach concerning
the Bible. Critics may be divided into conservative,
advanced, and moderate, but there is no propriety
or fitness in speaking of " lower " and " higher "
biblical critics ; because the so-called " lower " or
textual criticism must, as we have seen, precede the
so-called " higher " criticism. They are not conflict-
ing methods. Both kinds of criticism are performed
by the same critics. It is the views that any biblical
student adopts regarding the authorship, character,
and dates of the books of the Bible, which determine
whether he should be classed as a "higher critic" in
^he technical sense or not.
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 41
It is unfortunate that the term " higher criticism "
lias become popular in this misleadinr^ sense ; because,
as shall be shown further on, it makes a wrong
impression respecting the character and work of able
Hebrew scholars, who accept whatever has been proved
by sober criticism in modification of traditional opin-
ions about the Sacred Writings, but who, after the
most thorough and scholarly examination, reject the
distinguishing assumptions of the popular school of
" higher " critics. Though these conservative scholars
are higher critics in the best and fullest sense, yet
because of the special meaning the phrase has
acquired, to avOi confusion, wherever in this volume
the words '' higher critics " or " critics " occur without
([ualification, the advanced or evolutionary critics are
meant.
It may be as well at this point to give a brief state-
ment respecting the Pentateuchal controversy, because
of its intimate relation to the whole question of
modern Biblical Criticism. It is fitly remarked by
Dr. C. H. H. Wright that " the Pentateuch occupies in
the Old Testament a position akin to that which the
Four Gospels occupy in the New. The account of
our Lord's life, presented in the Four Gospels, is the
basis on which the system of faith, and doctrine
taught by the other writers of the New Testament is
founded. Similarly the history and theology of the
Pentateuch underlie the other books of the Old Testa-
ment."^
The Pentateuch cannot he discredited or degraded
'" Introduction," page 70.
42 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
without affecting the authority and truth of the other
books which imply its truth amd authenticity. This is
doubtless the reason why the assaults of the radical
critics on these foundation records have been so per-
sistent and relentless. The theories about other books
of the Old Testament largely stand or fall with the
theories about the Pentateuch, commonly called the
" Five Books of Moses."
It would probably be safe to say that the contro-
versy about the age, authorship, and origin of the
Pentateuch equals, in its interest and extent, the dis-
cussion on any other subject in the whole range of
modern or ancient literature. The subject, however,
is too technical and intricate, and embraces too many
minute and complex comparisons and conflicting
hypotheses to admit of any adequate popular exposi-
tion in these pages. All that can be done here is to
give a brief sketch of the main points at issue, that
our readers may be able to form some idea of the
standpoints of the parties in this controversy.
The main critical battle-ground is the Pentateuch,
or the " Hexateuch," as it is now the fashion to say.
But the inclusion of Joshua does not seriously affect
the questions in dispute. If the Bible view is right,
the book of Joshua must retain its historic char-
acter. If the critics are right, and the Pentateuch can
be proved to be a late production, Joshua must be a
still later work, written to follow it. In either case
Joshua is a sequel to the Pentateuch, and follows
Deuteronomy. If Joshua is a true history, coming
down from the times succeeding the events which it
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 4
o
records, as there is good ground to believe, then the
" higher criticism " of the Pentateuch largely falls to
the ground. The references to the history and laws
in the Pentateuch which are found in this book are so
explicit as to leave no room for the late origin assigned
to these laws by the evolutionary critics. Even if
Joshua is supposed to follow the late date which the
critics gratuitously give to Deuteronomy, yet, as Dr.
Cave has shown, " this Book of Joshua, as a matter of
fact, manifests an unmistakable familiarity with
significant details of the Levitical legislation, sup-
posed by the theorists to belong to the age of the
Babylonian Exile."
The origin of the modern critical speculations,
respecting the authorship and date of the Pentateuch,
may be credited to a volume entitled, " Conjectures
Concerning the Original Memoranda which it appears
Moses used to compose the Book of Genesis," pub-
lished anonymously at Brussels in 1753, by Jean
Astruc, a French Roman Catholic physician. The
main idea of this work was that the peculiar use of
the names "Elohim " and " Jehovah " (or Yaveh) to
denote the Divine Being, in the part treating of pre-
Mosaic times, indicated two different writers, one of
whom used " Jehovah " and the other " Elohim."
These supposed writers have been ever since desig-
nated, respectively, the " Elohist " and " Jehovist," the
alleged authors of two documents on which Genesis
was assumed to be based. Astruc also thought he saw
signs of other documents from which small fragments
were taken.
44 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Astruc's critical speculations were confined to
Genesis and Exodus I., II., the early date and Mosaic
authorship of which were not denied. The " conjec-
tures " of Astruc, at a later time, were followed by an
immense crop *' after their kind." Of these critics
Eichhorn, who was the author of the phrase " higher
criticism," was one of the ablest. He, however,
defended the antiquity of Genesis and regarded
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy as
older than all the other books of the Old Testament.
De Wette, Ewald, Hupfeld and other German writers
supplemented Astruc's theory by new " conjectures "
still more radical. These and later authors developed
the theory into a complete denial of the Mosaic
authorship of the Pentateuch. It was maintained,
with great show of learning, that the existence of two
component tales were proved by differences of style,
repetitions, contradictions, and anachronisms ; and
that the signs of two original documents seen in
Genesis extend to the other books of the Pentateuch
and to Joshua.
For a time what has been known as the " Frag-
mentary " theory was popular. Instead of two original
documents, it was assumed that the Pentateuch was
made up from a great variety of scraps and fragments.
The notion of a work of such coherent unity being
composed from unconnected fragments, of the exist-
ence of which there was no proof, was too absurd to
survive long.
The " Supplementary " theory was for some time
supported by eminent scholars. Its main feature was
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 45
that instead of two original documents there was only
one, that of the " Elohist ;" and that the •' Jehovist"
was a later writer, who revised and supplemented the
Elohist's document with new matter of his own.
Some critics who accepted this view held that the
Jehovist was the author of Deuteronomy, which they
regarded as the latest of the whole. A weak point in
this view was that the " Elohist " appears to have
a knowledge of facts, which were supposed to be
peculiar to the "Jehovist." The "Documentary" hypo-
thesis assumed that the Hexateuch was compiled from
different documents. The theory most dominant in
recent times has been thus stated by an eminent
scholar : Four principal original works were used by
a redactor in making up the Pentateuch (to go no
further) ; an Elohistic, which supplies about one-half
the matter ; a Jehovistic and another Elohistic, which
liave many likenesses and are closely united, and the
work of the Deuteronomist. The second and third
sources (J E) are held to be the older (about B.C. 1000-
800): next, Deuteronomy (D B.C. 621), and last E
(more usually named P, Priests' Code), which, by most,
is dated at the time of the Exile (B.C. 441). To each
of these three main divisions there is allotted a code ;
to J E, Ex. 21-28 ; to D, Deut. 12-26, and to P, the
priestly and other laws of Exodus, Leviticus and
Numbers.
But among the advocates of this scheme there are
many important difterences of opinion, respecting the
order and dates of composition of these documents
whose supposed authors are generally denoted by the
46 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
letters E, J, -E, JE, R, D and P. All the letters used
to indicate the imaginary authors of supposed docu-
ments and fragments of documents make a bewilder-
ing display of algebraic-like symbols, which are taken
as the names of writers of whom history knows
nothing whatever. Yet they are given a ** local
habitation and a name " with the greatest assurance.
The theory of original documents or " sources," and
that of three codes of laws in the Pentateuch, do not
involve such revolutionary consequences as the infer-
ences that have been based on them. There is nothing
inconsistent with inspiration in Moses using earlier
documents. It is also freely admitted that the laws
which critics designate " the three codes " are in the
Pentateuch, though not as separate and distinct codes.
What is called the " Priests' Code " has to be gathered
out of Exodus, Numbers, and Leviticus, to form that
code as constituted by the critics. The idea of these
codes being the outgrowth of widely different periods
is an essential part of the theory of these critics, to
which everything must be conformed.
The laws of " the Book of the Covenant," the so-
called " Priests' Code," and the " Deuteronomic Code "
are indeed found in the Pentateuch, with their appro-
priate historic setting. But many distinguished
scholars who admit this deny that there is evidence
that these codes contradict each other, or that they
were produced at three widely separated periods of
time, or were, respectively, the codes of the period
before King Josiah, of the period from Josiah to the
Exile, and of the period after the Exile. They admit
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?'' 47
the existence of these laws; but they reject the
assumed late dates of their composition and the new
idea of the religious history of Israel that has been
based on this view. Prof. G. H. Schodde justly says :
" The great evil of modern Pentateuchal criticism does
not lie in the analysis into documents ; but in the
erection upon this analysis of a superstructure of
pseudo-history and religion, that runs directly counter
to the revealed and historic character of the Penta-
teuch."'' Many other Hebrew scholars hold a similar
view.
Though the school of Graf, Wellhausen and Kuenen
accept the documentary theory in the main, yet the
order and time which these authors assign to different
parts of the Old Testament, in the opinion of so com-
petent a critic as Professor Herman Strack of Berlin,
whom we have mainly followed in this sketch, " has
introduced a wide chasm between critics of the
Pentateuch." He says : " The significance of this
new arrangement is at once visible in the revolution
it necessitates in our view of Hebrew history." For
example : The so-called " Elohist document," which
was once generally regarded by the chief " higher
critics" as the oldest, is now declared to be the latest
and least trustworthy of all. What ground is there
to believe that the later supposition is any truer than
the former one, which was once maintained with
equal positiveness, but is now rejected ?
The higher criticism of the Bible as described in
general terms is a right and laudable thing. But,
« •' Pentateuchal Testimony," p. 160.
48 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
owinor to the speculative way some critics carry out
the work in practice, the actual results do not corre-
spond with the theoretical ideal of the process. Hence,
no correct idea of this radical criticism can be ^iven
by any definition, describing it simply as a mode or
process of biblical study. Such a definition would
embrace all earnest and intelligent study of the origin
of the books of the Old Testament, without regard to
results. The best answer to the question, " What is
the higher criticism ?" is a brief statement of the
main distin<ruisliini; theories of these critics about the
Old Testament.
The leaders of what is now the most popular school
of " higher critics " generally regard the Old Testa-
ment simply as the religious literature of the people
of Israel ; or, in the words of another, " The sacred
Scriptures are but the product of the various stages of
religious attainment to which the people producing
the Scriptures had reached. These Scriptures simply
register the religious ideas of the ages in which they
were produced, instead of being the product of divine
interposition."" They are assumed to be the out-
come of an evolution, whose result is inconsistent
with the unity of nearly every book in the Old Testa-
ment. The Pentateuch, as has been shown, is disinte-
grated into sections, which are ascribed to suppositional
authors, in a way that denies the historicity of these
books in whole or in part.
It is asserted, as we have seen, that the overlapping
and contradictions show that not only Genesis, but
^ Prof. F. R. Beattie.
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM r' 49
other books were compiled from different documents
at widely different times, by unknown authors and
redactors, or editors, who did their work so clumsily
that modern critics, after the lapse of nearly three
thousand years, when Hebrew has long ceased to be
a living language, can confidently assign each frag-
ment to its nameless author, or to the interpolation
of a "redactor." Prof. W. W. Davies, of Delaware,
Ohio, speaking of Professor Moore's treatment of the
book of Job in the " Polychrome Bible," says : " The
little patches, sometimes only a word or two, are
arranged with as much skill as if Professor Moore had
cut them out of an ancient manuscript and pasted
them together. And yet, let us remember, that no
such manuscript existed. But that our learned friend
had to draw altogether upon his imagination." This is
equally true of other writers of this critical school.
Indeed, this work of guessing " sources," and assigning
them to supposed writers, has become the chief
business of these critics. The Psalms are all, or nearly
all, assigned to the period after the Babylonian
captivity, Formerly a great question in criticism was
whether the last twenty-seven chapters of Isaiah
were by some " Great Unknown?" as Ewald held ; but
recent critics represent that great prophecy to be a
patchwork of fragments hy various unknown authors.
ex-President Bartlett, speaking of the " Polychrome
Bible," says : " It may be doubted whether Professor
Cheyne could find three scholars of high repute in
England, America or Germany, to accept fully his
dismemberment of Isaiah into more than one hundred
4
50 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
and sixty fragments, with scores of transpositions,
numerous lacuna and rejections, tof^ether with the
assignment of some twenty dates, ranging through
four hundred and sixty- five years."" Other books
are similarly disintegrated.
" The Book of the Law," which Hilkiah found in
the temple, is said to have been Deuteronomy, which
then contained only from the 12th to the 2Gth chapter,
and had been written not long before by some un-
known author, who ascribed it to Moses. Wellhausen
does not admit that even the Decalogue is Mosaic.
" The Book of the Covenant" (Exodus xx., 23; xxii.),
he considers, was given to a settled agricultural
people, and therefore does not date from the time of
the Exodus. He overlooks the fact that these laws
were given to a people who were shortly to enter
upon an agricultural land of promise, and therefore
were well adapted to the need of the Hebrews. The
ritual and laws designated the " Priests' Code" are said
to have been prepared after the Babylonian Exile by
priests, and attributed to Moses. Portions of Genesis,
which have always been held to be historical, are
declared mythical or allegorical. The New Testament
conception of prophecy and fulfilment is rejected. It
is assumed that Jehovah was regarded by the
Israelites, long after the exodus, merely as a tribal
god, like the gods of the heathen peoples around
Israel. The " Tabernacle of the Congregation," or
" Tent of Meeting," is declared to be a late invention
copied from Solomon's temple, that had no actual
existence.
® Homiletic Review, November, 1898.
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM r 51
The comparative fewness of the references to the
ritual and laws of the Pentateuch in the prophets, is
taken as proof that the people of Israel in the time of
their greatest national prosperity knew nothing of
the laws in Deuteronomy or the Levitical service,
because they did not yet exist. It is even denied that
the prophets of the 7th and 8th centuries B.C., knew
the laws or ritual contained in the Pentateuch. We
must no longer say " the law and the prophets," but
" the prophets and the law." The assumption that
the laws in the Pentateuch were written at the late
times alleged by the critics, implies that the historic
narratives, which give an account of the occasions on
which they were promulgated, are a fictitious setting,
evidently meant to make it appear that they were
Mosaic, when, according to the critics, they were not.
The accounts of Creation and the Flood given in
Genesis are said to be taken from Babylonian legends.
The predictive element in prophecy is largely ignored
by these critics, or assumed to be only fallible antici-
pations of what the prophets thought God would do,
or the natural course of events bring about. These
critics generally ignore or deny that there are pro-
phetic predictions in the Old Testament which fore-
tell the advent, life, and sufferings of Jesus Christ ;
or that these were fulfilled by the events of His life
and death, as recorded in the New Testament. The
books of Chronicles are said to have been written in
the interests of the priests, by an author who w^rought
into alleged records of past times, as if they w^ere facts,
references to ritual ceremonies that were much later
inventions. This supposed questionable method of
52 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
the chronicler is cited by Dr. Driver, as an example of
the way in which other Old Testament books were
composed. The book of Daniel is said to be the pro-
duction of some pious Hebrew of the time of Antiochus,
written to encourage his people under persecution.
Doubtless, some who are in sympathy with the
views of the critics, and have even adopted their main
hypothesis, may deny that they accept all these con-
clusions, but they are all advocated by leading critics,
and it ^ay be said that they largely stand or fall
together. For the main assumption, that the Hebrew
Scriptures were the product of a national literary
development, which is implied even when not avowed,
requires a general application to save the scheme.
Let only one of the chief critical hypotheses, such as
the late authorship and non-Mosaic character of
Deuteronomy, be disproved, and the whole evolution-
ary scheme of the Old Testament will be seen to be in
danger of a fatal collapse.
The consequence of assuming these theories of
the higher critics, as we sliall show fully in future
chapters, is to discredit the Old Testament records, to
make out that " the law was not ' given by Moses,' but
produced by evolution," to deny that several of the
books were written by the authors to whom they have
been ascribed, to divest the Sacred Writings of char-
acteristics that have invested them with authority for
all Christians, and to lead to the conclusion that the
actual religious state of the people of Israel was not
what the historic books of the Old Testament repre-
sented it to have been. Hence, the advocates of these
critical theories feel bound to imagine for the Hebrews
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM?" 53
a different religious condition and history. Kuenen
boldly avows, for the critical school which he repre-
sents, that their critical science brings them " to foriR
a conception of Israel's development totally different
from that which, as any one may see, is set forth in
the Old Testannent." This is certainly a frank confes-
sion.
The general scheme of these critics is thus described
by Prof. James Robertson, of the University of
Glasgow : " What they maintain is, that the scheme
of the biblical writers is an afterthought, which, by a
process of manipulation of older documents and by a
systematic representation of earlier events in the light
of much later times, has been made to appear as if
it were the original and genuine development ; and
they think they are able, by separating the early from
the late constituents of the writings, and by a legiti-
mp.te process of criticism, to prove from the biblical
documents themselves that the history and the
religious movement had quite a different course.""
Before passing from the general subject of the
higher criticism of the Pentateuch, it may be well to
very briefly indicate some of the lines of reply to the
dissective critics that have been urged by more con-
servative biblical scholars It is affirmed that the
passages which have been cited as affording evidence
against the unity of Genesis and other books of the
Pentateuch, are subjected to strained and exaggerated
constructioi.s, without recognizing that they can
otherwise be reasonably explained. It is also forcibly
» "Early Religion of Israel," p. 30.
54 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
nicairitained that the use of the two names of the
Divine Being and the difference of style may be fairly
accounted for, by their being appropriate to the
occasions on which they are used, and to the subjects
in which they occur.
Notwithstanding the positiveness with which the
critics dissect the books of the Old Testament, and
assign unknown authors to books and parts of books
at will, many thorough Hebrew and Oriental scholars
maintain that tne use of particular words, or a differ-
ence of style in places in the same book, does not
justify the theory of different authors and redactors
which has been so confidently built upon these things.
The distinguished Oriental scholar, Professor Sayce,
of Oxford University, in an article in the Contempor-
ary Review, says : " The critic is as cock-sure of his
analysis as he is of the approximate age to which each
writer or redactor should be assigned. A ' polychro-
matic edition of the Old Testament' is even being
published in America, in which the ' eminent biblical
scholars of Europe and America' exhaust all the
colors of the rainbow in the effort to represent the
literary Mosaic work of the ancient Hebrew books.
" Surely I am right in saying that such criticism is
extravagant. Conceive of a similar ' analysis ' being
applied to any English book, say of the Elizabethan
era. Even in tlie case of a modern English work, like
a novel of Besant and Rice, where we know that there
is a dual authorship, the attempt to separate and dis-
tinguish between the two authors would be futile and
impossible. And yet English is a language which we
WHAT IS THE ''HIGHER CRITICISM f' 55
all speak and profess to know, and English literature is
almost limitless in extent. The student of the Old
Testament is in a very different position. The Hebrew
literature that has come down to him is but a frag-
ment of what once existed, and the interpretation of
a good deal of it is doubtful. Our knowledge of the
Hebrew language is in the highest degree imperfect ;
our Hebrew lexicons contain but a fraction of the
words once possessed by it, and the meaning of many
of the words which have been preserved, as well as of
the idioms of the grammar, is merely a matter of con-
jecture. When we add to this that the critics are
Europeans or Americans, whose training and modes
of thought are utterly alien from those of the East,
we may well come to the conclusion that the boasted
' analysis ' of the Pentateuch is but an ingenious way
of weaving ropes out of sand."
The late Prof. E. C. Bissell points out that while
the modern critics teach that Genesis was mainly com-
piled long after the time of Moses from two conflicting
documents of different dates, " the Babylonian tablets
contain in the form of a continuous narrative, the
more prominent facts of both the alleged Elohistic
and Jehovistic sections of Genesis, and present them
mainly in the same order, as one can plainly see." ^'^ In
the same way it has been shown that the poetic and
plain statements respecting the coming on of the flood
in Genesis vii. 11, 12, which the critics regard as a
proof of different authors, have a counterpart in the
story told to Izdubar. This Babylonian story, which
1^ " Genesis in Colors," p. xiii.
56 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
combines what is deemed characteristic of both the
Elohist and Jehovist documents, was in existence long
before the time at which the disintegrating critics
allege some Hebrew scribe combined the two docu-
ments in the account in Genesis.
Prof. W. H. Green, of Princeton, after fully and
fairly stating the strongest arguments for the disin-
tegration theory, and giving his reasons for rejecting
it, says : '' The existence of these documents and redac-
tors is purely a matter of critical discovery. There is
no evidence of their existence, and no pretence of any,
apart from the critical tests which have determined
the analysis. All traditional and all historical
testimony, as to the origin of the Pentateuch, are
against them." " Keil, according to Strack, " bases
the Mosaic authorship upon the testimonies of the
Pentateuch itself, the historical books of the Old
Testament, the prophets and the New Testament,
and finally that the Pentateuch shows no vestiges
of post-Mosaic events and customs, no chronological
errors, but exhibits a unity of spirit and language*
and meets every expectation so great an antiquity
would arouse." ^^
There is great force in these words of the late
Bishop Hervey of England : " The whole life and
career of the Hebrew race, from the earliest dawn of
profane history down to the present year, is a stand-
ing witness that the narrative in the Pentateuch is
not fiction."
"" Moses and His Critics," p. 104.
12 «« Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia," p. 1791.
CHAPTER IV.
CONSERVATIVE BIBLICAL SCHOLARS
AND FREE CRITICISM.
Free Criticism a Sacred Right — Orthodox Scholars Advocate
this — Young Ministers Should Read Both Sides — Objec-
tions not Based On Prejudice — Critical Principles and Facts
Accepted by Conservative Critics.
BEFORE proceeding to examine the distinguishing
theories of the critical school, referred to in our
last chapter, I deem it desirable to correct a wide-
spread impression with regard to the position and
work of those we have called conservative biblical
scholars. There are misleading ideas respecting them
" in the air " which need to be cleared away.
The right and duty of a sober free criticism of the
Bible should be fearlessly maintained. Neither
reverence for the Sacred Writino;s nor fear of conse-
(juences, should cause Christians to object to a
tliorough scrutiny into everything that can throw
light upon the origin of the Holy Scriptures, their
authors, the time when they were written, and their
purpose and true meaning. At the same time, it
should be kept in mind that a great deal depends
upon the spirit and beliefs with which we come to the
study of the Bible. No doubt freedom of thought,
57
58 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
like freedom of action, may be unwisely exercised ;
but it must not on that account be renounced or
denied. If there are Christian teachers who contemn
all critical study of the books of the Bible, and cling
to everything that has been held in the past, we do
not speak for this class.
I desire to give no uncertain sound regarding this
right ; because it is often incorrectly alleged or
assumed, as I have already intimated, that all who
repudiate or question the views of the advanced
critics are opposed to freedom of thought and enquiry
on biblical questions. From some things said and
written one might suppose that, on one side stood the
" higher critics," battling for thorough and independ-
ent study of the contents of the Old Testament ; and,
on the other side stood only unlearned " traditional-
ists," resisting independent criticism and protesting
against everything that does not agree with the old
beliefs of the Church ; and for this reason condemning
and rejecting every new idea. This is not a true
representation of the case.
Yet Canon Driver says : " Nor can it be doubted
that the same conclusions upon any neutral field of
investigation would have been accepted by all convers-
ant with the subject ; they are only opposed in the
present instance by some theologians, because they
are supposed to conflict with the requirements of the
Christian faith." ^ This is a partial and unjustifiable
assertion. It is unwarrantable to charge able biblical
scholars who have rejected certain speculative
!•• Introduction," p. x.
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 59
theories, because on thorough examination they found
that they were not supported by the evidence of facts,
with having no reason for their conclusions but that
these new ideas were " supposed to conflict with the
requirements of the Christian faith." The many
gifted and learned theologians who have rejected the
theories of Wellhausen and his British and American
disciples, and laid bare the partial criticisms of Dr.
Driver himself, have not justified themselves by
appealing to the beliefs and interpretations of the
church in past times, nor by denying the right of free
higher criticism.
Suppose we should allege that all those who declare
themselves in favor of the theories of these critics
do so just because they are something new, whose
adoption gives one a reputation for being progressive
and independent, would this be deemed fair by the
advocates of the new criticism ? Not likely. Yet
this would be just as fair as to allege that those who
do not accept the new theories about the evolution of
the Old Testament, do so simply because it is not the
traditional view.
It is inexcusable for anyone, who is acquainted with
the current literature of the subject, to assert or
assume that all the biblical learning represented by
higher criticism, in its best and widest sense, is
possessed by the development critics. It is not
scholarship against ignorant prejudice, as some allege,
but critic against critic. Such eminent biblical
scholars as Lightfoot, Westcott, Green, Rawlinson,
Bissell, Cave, Robertson, Orelli, Perowne, Osgood,
60 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Chambers, Schodde, Bartlett, Wright, Ellicott.Hommel,
Meade, Leathes, Douglas, Behrends, Hengstenberg,
Beecher, Saycc, Edersheim, Davison and Harman,
have used the best methods and resources of modern
biblical learning, just as truly and as independently
as Kuenen, Wellhausen, Robertson Smith, Cornill,
Cheyne, Briggs, Bennett, Toy, Brown and Driver. No
doubt, the greater notoriety of the latter class is
largely the result of their wider departure from the
historic belief respecting the Bible, We do not mean
by the historic belief any special theory of inspiration,
but simply faith in the truth, trustworthiness and
divine authority of the Holy Scriptures.
Conservative scholars, just as strongly as advanced
critics, have advocated free biblical criticism. A few
examples of this may not be superfluous, in view of the
popular misconceptions regarding the position and
attitude of the theologians who reject the evolutional
theory of the Bible.
Prof. W. H. Green, of Princeton, who was chair-
man of the American Committee on the revision of
the Old Testament, and is generally admitted to be
the most eminent Hebrew scholar in America, and
the most effective critic of the rationalist criticism of
the Pentateuch, says : " We most assuredly have no
disposition to decry the science of biblical criticism.
Its province is to investigate the origin and structure
of the books of the Bible, to ascertain when and by
whom and under what circumstances and for what
purpose they were written, and to determine the
nature of their contents. These are not only proper
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 61
subjects of enquiry, but they are very important to a
correct understanding and a right appreciation of the
Bible as a whole, and of its several parts. And we do
not object to the ' higher criticism ' of the Pentateuch.
It is not only entirely legitimate, but extremely
serviceable, if properly applied. We welcome the
most thorough and searching enquiry into the author-
sliip and the historical character of the Pentateuch.
Such an enquiry, fairly conducted, can only result in
establishing the truth of the record and the reality
of its claims."- Dr. Green has shown his faith by his
works, in his learned and acute writings on the Pen-
tateuch, in which he ably replies to the disintegrating
critics.
Prof. Howard Osgood, who has ably criticized the
rationalist theories, and who was also a member of
the Old Testament Committee, says : " To oppose
criticism as an operation of the mind is bald stultifi-
cation, for the very opposition is criticism. . . .
Liberty is the first requisite for truth, discovery, pro-
gress, as well as for the right preservation of what
has been previously gained. The truth has nothing
to fear from liberty."^ Dr. Osgood's articles in the
Bihliotheca Sacra and other periodicals are among
the most effective criticisms of the hypotheses of the
" higher " critics.
Dr. C. H. H. Wright, author of an " Introduction to
the Old Testament," is regarded as a conservative
scholar by advanced critics, yet, he says : " A bold
* Presbyterian and Reformed Review, July, 1894.
^ Bihliotheca Sacra, October, 1892.
62 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
and fearless attitude, however, on all such questions,
on the part of the biblical student, is more likely to
convince gainsayers and to inspire confidence than a
timid appeal to authority by the endeavor to put an
undue strain on New Testament statements. . . .
No theories of inspiration can be permitted to stifle
investigation."*
Principal Cave, of Hackney College, London, is
well known as one of the ablest of the English con-
servative biblical scholars. His work on " The In-
spiration of the Old Testament Inductively Con-
sidered," is one of the very best works on Inspiration.
He says : " The critical method is the prosecution
of knowledge by, first, classifying facts, and next,
reasoning from the facts when classified. The man
who refuses to acknowledge the legitimacy of such a
method in the study of the Bible is no friend to the
Bible, and is, whether he knows it or not, either a
tyro or a traitor. For who will long believe where
he may not think ? and who will long think in fet-
ters ? Freedom, freedom to follow where thought
leads, is of the essence of thought; and thought,
thought regulated by its own laws, is of the essence
of belief. Now, the so-called higher criticism of the
Bible in its idea is simply rational examination of
the facts of the Bible — its facts of literature and its
facts of history, its style and its contents, by the aid
of comparison and inference."^
These and many other evangelical Hebrew scholars
♦"Introduction," p. 83.
^ "Battle of the Standpoints," p. 11.
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 63
have illustrated the spirit of their pleas for freedom,
in their writings on this subject. In such works as
Robertson's " Early Religion of Israel ;" Green's " Higher
Criticism of the Pentateuch;" "Lex Mosaica;" Cave's
" Inspiration of the Old Testament ; " Edersheim's
" Warburton Lectures ; " Bissell's " The Pentateuch,
its Origin and Structure ; " Ellicott's " Christus Com-
probator ; " " The Veracity of the Pentateuch," by ex-
President Bartlett ; Beattie's " Radical Criticism ; "
" Moses and his Recent Critics ; " Delitzsch's " Mes-
sianic Prophecies ; " Orelli's " Old Testament Pro-
phecy ; " Sir J. W. Dawson's " Modern Science in
Bible Lands ; " Green's " Moses and the Prophets ; "
the last edition of Harman's "Introduction to the
Holy Scriptures;" and in numerous articles in reviews,
the theories and arguments of the disintegrating
critics have been ably reviewed, and most of their
main conclusions shown to be fanciful and untenable
guesswork. It is not, therefore, dogmatic " tradition-
alists " who contemn all higher criticism, that have to
be met and answered by the " higher critics."
It should not therefore he forgotten or ignored that
THERE ARE ORTHODOX HIGHER CRITICS, omd that the
results of modern biblical criticism embrace more
than the theories of the evolutional critical school.
Yet many otherwise intelligent Christians, and even
some ministers, speak as if they were not aware of
the fact, that able and learned biblical scholars have
thoroughly gone over the same ground, dealt with the
same facts, and examined the same critical problems,
as the advanced critics of Germany, Britain and
64 THE HIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
America. These eminent conservative scholars have
not tested the new views by the traditional beliefs of
the past. They have accepted whatever has been
fairly proved, and rejected what they deemed built
upon conjecture, or considered the result of precon-
ceived critical dogmas ; in every case giving pertinent
facts and arguments to justify their critical conclu-
sions. The significance of this fact, in its bearing
upon the main questions at issue, has not been auly
recotrnised.
Some young ministers make the mistake of accept-
ing as critical oracles such writers as Driver, Harper,
Bruce, Briggs, Farrar and Horton, while they neglect
to examine the writings of not less able and independ-
ent biblicists, who have pointed out the doubtful
methods and untenable theories of Wellhausen and
his followers. I do not say to any young minister :
" Professor Green, or Professor Robertson, or Professor
Rawlinson is an eminent Hebrew scholar, therefore
you should accept his views." But I would say to
every Bible student, that these writers I have named
have written ably and convincingly against the
extreme theorists ; and no confidence of young minis-
ters, in their own ability to judge the work of the
higher critics, should prevent them from giving fair
and full consideration to what has been written on
the other side of the question. Theological students
who go to Germany to study, and while there hear
only the ingenious and plausible views of advanced
critics, do not deal fairly with themselves or the
opponents of rationalist theories of the Bible.
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 65
A sentiment of personal sympathy with one who
has hroken away from conservative views may be
natural and f]renerous ; but some stronger reason than
this should determine our belief about the Holy
Scriptures. In view of the great interests at stake,
all young ministers should give earnest personal con-
sideration to the arguments against the critical
speculations of the advocates of the development
theory. Such consideration will at least convince
them how unjustifiable it is, for men to talk as if
nothing but ignorance and prejudice prevents any one
from accepting the disintegrating hypothesis of the
Scriptures, with all its negations.
We have no disposition to disparage the learning or
deny the sincerity of higher critics, whose conclusions
we deem " not proven." But the confident assertions
of advocates of the new criticism, as to its acceptance
by " all scholars," have, to a considerable extent, pre-
vented the Christian public from realizing the fact,
that the learned Hebrew scholars do not by any means
all accept the scheme of critics who regard the Bible
as the product of national development. When any
one speaks of the conclusions of modern critics, he
should indicate what critics and what conclusions he
means. It is unjustifiable and misleading for any
writer or public teacher to speak, as is sometimes
done, as if there was some definite product of thought
known and recognized as " the result of modern
biblical criticism."
I The able and independent Oriental scholars who
I reject many of the conclusions of German and English
66 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
critics, have not done this merely because the new
views are " supposed " to conflict with the Christian
faith of the past ; but because they are convinced that
the analytic critics have not made good their critical
conjectures. Are not the conclusions of such biblical
scholars as Green, Robertson of Glasgow, Edersheim,
Cave, Bissell, Saj^ce, and Hommel, as much entitled to
be regarded as *' results of modern critical scholar-
ship," as those of men who have come to the study of
the Bible with a theory of evolution to which every-
thing must bend ?
Dr. Driver knows very well that in every case
the conservative biblical scholars have given reasons
for their conclusions, which, whether satisfactory to
him or not, prove that they have something to say to
justify their position, besides what he alleges. The
practice of ignoring the facts and arguments of
conservative scholars, and counting none worthy of
the name of " scholars " but those who agree with
them, may be convenient tactics for partisan contro-
versialists, but certainly cannot be commended for its
fairness. It naturally called out comments when the
late Prof. Robertson Smith re-issued his " Old Testa-
ment in the Jewish Church," without taking any
notice of the critical objections of such able scholars
as Professor Green of Princeton, and Professor Watts
of Belfast.
It is well known that a preacher or writer, who
assails what is held as orthodox in a community, is
sure to attract more attention than he would other-
wise have secured. A reputation for heterodoxy never
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 67
fails to enhance a man's reputation for scholarship
and ability, and to give him an undue importance
beyond what his talents would otherwise have com-
manded. j3ut a man may be quite a linguist and have
a natural penchant for new ideas, and yet be wanting
in that impartiality and soundness of judgment, which
are essential to make him a safe leader in theology
and biblical criticism. Learning does not preclude
partial judgment, or make men infallible oracles.
In these days the author or the preacher who advo-
cates any new ideas in theology, whether true or false,
generally seems to think that he should be regarded
as a Galileo, a Luther, or an Arminius, animated
solely by an exceptional love of truth ; but that all
who venture to question his infallibility, and defend
" those things which are most surely believed among
us," are to be treated as people to whom exploded
creeds are dearer than truth. It is true that things
denounced as heresy at one time have been accepted
as truth at another. But the history of human
tliought does not justify anyone in assuming that
opposition to the general belief, or the advocacy of
new theories, is a sure sign of being right. Many
advocates of new things, that were to supersede the
old order, have turned out to be false prophets, who
misled those who were weak enough to follow them.
The rejection of some critical conjectures, evidently
made in the interest of a rationalist scheme, should
not lay any one open to be stigmatized as an opponent
of free criticism, or modern learning. Yet one can
hardly utter an objection, or a refutation of what he
68 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
is convinced is unscriptural and dengerous teaching
about the Bible, without being characterised as one
who " treats conscientious and devout investigation as
if it were wrong and heretical," if not as an intolerant
persecutor of those who, it is complacently assumed,
love truth better than traditional beliefs. Is the
liberty of thought to be all on one side ? Is the
rationalist critic to be free to assail principles and
beliefs which are held to be sacred truths, and are
men to be stigmatized as opponents of independent
biblical study, because they claim the right to defend
what tliey believe to be true, and condemn what they
believe to be erroneous ? That seems to be the idea
of freedom of thought which some advocates of the
negative theories of Old Testament prophecy and
New Testament fulfilment have adopted.
But assuredly men are not bound to accept or con-
done views of the Bible which they are convinced are
crude and contrary to the weight of proof, in order
to show that they are not opposed to thorough and
independent criticism. In conceding to all men the
right of independent thought, we do not assume any
obligation to accept their conclusions, whether we deem
them true or not. When, I decline to accept the beliefs
of Unitarians and Roman Catholics, I do not deny
their right to study the Scriptures for themselves, and
to hold the opinions that they deem true ; nor do I in
any way interfere with their freedom of thought.
It may be asked, what results of modern biblical
criticism are accepted by those who may be regarded
as sober and independent biblical scholars ? Neither
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 69
the space available, my want of a right to speak for
them, nor the main purpose and scope of this work,
will permit an attempt to discuss so large a subject.
Besides, these authors have not adopted any stereo-
typed creed on these subjects. Yet a few obser-
vations may serve as a partial indication of an answer
to this question.
Professor Zenos, of Chicago, in a recent article in
the Homiletic Review, on the " Accredited Principles
of the Higher Criticism," points out with much force
and clearness that certain principles of criticism are
generally accredited as proper ; but that they may be
applied in a way that renders the conclusions based
upon them unworthy of confidence. For example, it is
admitted that the literary features of a work may in-
dicate its authorship. As a general principle this can-
not be denied. But there may be differences of style,
owing to the difference of subject, or to different parts
of a book being written at different periods of an
author's life, which would not justify the assumption
of different authors. It is also accepted as a sound
historic principle, " that a writing fits into the historic
setting in which it arose." But, as Professor Zenos
shows, the correspondence between a writing and a
particular period may be too general to settle the
question of its date. He who builds an inference
respecting the time of a work on this principle " must
show that the marks left by the historical surround-
ing on the writing are those which only the setting
he claims for it could have left on it." Another
principle, which it is admitted conservative higher
70 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Titles accept as sound, is that the theological or
religious thought of a writer may serve as a means of
identifying him and his time. But in using this
principle an unverified theory of evolution may be
adopted, and the sacred writings be judged by their
conformity to a supposed religious condition, that had
no historic existence at the time to which they have
been assigned by the critics. This has actually been
done in many cases by modern critics.
Professor Zenos pertinently remarks : " The validity
of the results will depend on whether the principles
corroborate and support one another in leading to the
results ; that is, whether they converge. ... If
the literary, historical, and theological principles can
be shown to unite in support of a conclusion, then its
value will be so great that if tradition contradicts it,
it may be fairly assumed that tradition is in error."*'
Most conservative scholars hold no mechanical
theory of inspiration, such as is sometimes ascribed
to them. Thev admit that Genesis and some other
parts of the Old Testament are based upon older
documents ; but they do not admit that this hypo-
thesis implies any great difference in the age of these
documents. They admit that some places in the Pen-
tateuch present signs of unimportant additions by
copyists later than the time of Moses, such as the
statement that certain Kings reigned in Edom "before
there reigned any King over the children of Israel."
But, as Dean Chad wick says, "The fact that the
Prayer Book contains prayers for Queen Victoria
° Homiletic Review, October, 1898.
CONSERVATIVE HIGHER CRITICS. 71
does not prove that it is not the product of a much
earlier time."
They do not assert that Moses wrote the five books
of the Pentateucli with his own hand ; but that the
laws and history were at least recorded under his
direction and by his authority. That some changes
of form may have been made in transcribing the laws
at later times is conceded by some of these biblical
scholars. Some parts of the Pentateuch are plainly
said to have been written by Moses. The issue now
is not whether Moses wrote the whole Pentateuch,
but whether its records of what took place are true
history, clothed with Mosaic authority, or a fictitious
setting for late codes by unknown authors. The
main question is: Did Monen do and say wliat these
hooks ascribe to Jtiin? The "higher" critics deny
that he did.
Those whom we call conservative critics generally
admit that Ecclesiastes and Chronicles were written
later than was formerly supposed ; but not that the
ritual and laws called the '* Priests' Code " were late
productions falsely ascribed to Moses. They do not
admit that Deuteronomy was written in the time
of Manasseh or Josiah by an unknown author.
They hold that the neglect of the laws of Moses at
certain times does not prove them to have been un-
known or non-existent. In these remarks we make
no pretence of giving a full statement of what is
accepted by "conservative higher critics." Some
authors, whose learning and piety cannot be ques-
tioned, accept the " Deutero-Isaiah " and other critical
72 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
theories, which may safely be left to await the ulti-
mate judgment of the future.
It would be presumption for me to attempt to
assign biblical writers to the critical schools to which
they belong. There is a class of authors who repudi-
ate the extreme views of radical critics, and yet ac-
cept and build upon their main assumptions, whom it
is very hard to classify. It is difficult to draw a
clearly-defined dividing line. The acceptance of late
dates and anonymous sources for the contents of the
books of the Old Testament, to adjust them to the
development theory, is a pretty sure sign of an
author's position. The answers that will be given to
such questions as : Do you accept Deuteronomy as
being what, on the face of it, it assumes to be ? Do
you accept the New Testament conception of Old
Testament prophecy and fulfilment ? will show with
tolerable certainty the school to which a critic
belongs.
The main distinction between the conservative and
the advanced critics is, that those whom we designate
" conservative higher critics " accept the Pentateuch
and other books of the Old Testament as being what
they assume to be, records of actual events and divine
revelations of truth, and not late fabrications, art-
fully written, so as to make the impression that
they had an antiquity and authority to which, ac-
cording to the " higher " critics, they have no claim.
CHAPTER V.
THEORIES BUILT ON IMAGINARY
STATES OF LITERARY AND RELI-
GIOUS KNOWLEDGE.
Making History Fit a Scheme-An Unjustifiable Way of Fixing
Dates _ Archaeology Contradicts the Higher Critics-
Accounts in Genesis not Babylonian-Import of Recent
Discoveries not Recognized.
'J^HE way in which the dates of the books of the
A Bible are fixed, by their agreement or disagree-
ment with the supposed condition of the people at
certain times, seems to indicate that it is an under-
lymg axiom of this critical school, that the state of
literary and religious knowledge at any past period
must be made to harmonize with the requirements of
the evolutionary theory of these critics. Acting on
this latent maxim, they assign late dates to certain
pnrts of the Old Testament, on the ground that in
style or ideas they are too far in advance of the
literary or religious condition of the times to which
they have been ascribed. This is persistently done
though the critics have not, and cannot claim to have'
any special means of knowing what was the religious
or literary condition of the people of those remote
times.
73
74 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
It is pertinently observed by Canon George Raw-
linson : " Unless we accept the historical books as
delivering to us, in the main, a faithful and trust-
worthy account of the people and of the vicissitudes
through which they passed, we must confess our-
selves to be absolutely without any knowledge at all
of the national history, for nearly a thousand years
after the Exodus. To construct for ourselves a differ-
ent history from this, out of our own theories of
what is likely to have taken place, or by the use of
an ecclectic process which consists in accepting as
much as we like and rejecting as much as we do
not like of the extant narrative, is to substitute fancy
for fact, idealism for reality, a mere imaginary pic-
ture of past times for an authenticated account of
them."^
This way of determining the dates of books and
sections of books, by a comparison of their ideas with
an assumed state of religious knowledge, appears to be
adopted with an idea that if long periods of time be
allowed for development, this will make it less neces-
sary to admit supernatural revelations of religious
truth. This is more extensively implied than openly
expressed ; though it is sometimes expressed plainly
enough. A few examples may be given to illustrate
the common practice of these theorizing critics.
Canon Driver says : " The prophetic teaching of
Deuteronomy, the point of view from which the laws
are presented, the principles by which conduct is
estimated, presuppose a relatively advanced stage of
1" Lex Mosaica," p. 30.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 75
theological reilcxion, as they also approximate to
what is found in Jeremiah and Ezekiel."" Just as if
unity of teaching was not to be expected in the
books of the Bible. Has it not inspired Christian
faith in the divine inspiration of the sacred writings,
that there was a golden thread of ethical unity run-
ning through the different books of the Holy Scrip-
tures, which was a powerful evidence that these holy
men " spake from God being moved by the Holy
Ghost " ? Must this belief be discarded in future ?
Allan Menzies, speaking of Moses, says : " Even if
he were to some extent a man of letters (and it is
doubtful if he could be so), any written words of his
which survive must be extremely short." ^ Speaking
of the pre-Mosaic Age, Schultz says : " It was a time
prior to all knowledge of writing."*
The Rev. Buchanan Blake, speaking of the religious
teaching of Jonah, says : " While again the distinct
purpose of the writer to teach that Nineveh might be
forgiven on true repentance, is a purpose that speaks
of a time when the lessons of Isaiah and Jeremiah had
been well learned. Only after the Exile were such
principles as this book contains inculcated."^ Unity
of Scripture teaching is evidently repudiated.
Wellhausen says : " The question why it was that
Elijah and Elisha committed nothing to writing while
Amos, a hundred years later, is an author, hardly
2" Introduction," p. 83.
'" National Religion," p. 15.
**' Old Testament Theology," p. 25.
'■' " How to Read the Prophets," Jonah, p. 13.
76 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
admits of any other answer than that in the interval
a non-literary had developed into a literary age."*
Principal Wace says : "In the introduction to Dr.
Kautsch's recent and useful German translation of
the Old Testament, it is expressly stated that there
was not, and could not be, much writing in the early
days of Jewish history ; but that Jewish literature
began, like that of other nations, with popular songs
and ballads, such as those which are found in the early
books of the Old Testament." Dr. Wace pertinently
adds : " Such a supposition would seem, indeed, indis-
pensable to the theory." ^
Canon Driver, speaking of the 90th Psalm, which
has the superscription, " A prayer of Moses, the Man
of God," says : " Psalm ninety in dignity and deep
religious feeling is second to none in the Psalter ; but
it may be questioned whether it does not presuppose
conditions different from those of Moses' age ; and had
Moses been the author, it is natural to suppose that it
would have been more archaic in style than it
actually is."^ This way of settling questions is very
characteristic of Driver.
But in assigning dates and authors at will, in the
way that suits his theory, Canon Cheyne in his
lectures on the Psalms takes the palm. In this work
we have many such illustrations of this practice as
the following : " Pre- Jeremian such highly spiritual
Psalms (Ixi. and Ixii.) cannot be."** " Such ripe fruit of
spiritual religion could not, me thinks, have been pro-
« " History of Israel," p. 46i. « " introduction," p. 358.
' '• Lex Mosaica," p. 613. '^Ihid., p. 99.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 77
diiccd in the miseries and anxieties of that period,"
(namely of Jehoiachin) ; and therefore " the earliest
possible date " (of Psalms xxii., xxxv., Ixix.) is " the
period which preceded Nehemiah's first journey to
Jerusalem." *" " Davidic it (Psalm xix.) cannot be ;
fancy the worldly-minded, even though religious,
])avid inditing a hynm in favor of a rich and varied
hand-book of spiritual religion."'^ " The Jewish
church in Isaiah's time was far too germinal to have
sung these expressions of daring monotheism." '"^
Proof of these assumptions is not deemed at all neces-
sary. Such expressions as " it is natural to suppose,"
and " it may be questioned " do duty for proof with
Driver and Cheyne.
But the instances in which there is an actual avowal
of this unjustifiable method convey no ade(]uate idea
of the extent to which it is quietly assumed as an
indubitable axiom, that the times to which the Penta-
teuch and other early books of the Old Testament are
assigned were so barbaric and illiterate, as to give a
general warrant for rejecting those early dates and
authors, and substituting dates and authors in har-
mony with the theories of the higher critics. A large
proportion of the results of the higher criticism is
built on these assumed hypotheses concerning the
religious and literary condition of the times, when the
books of the Old Testament have been assumed to
have been written.
The recent discoveries in Oriental archaeology clearly
show that the supposition, on which the critics have
^^Ibid., p. 230. "/&id, p. 237. ^-Ihid., p. 164.
78 THE lilBLK UNDER UluIlER CRITICISM.
built such lar^e conclusions, is not accordinf^ to tlie
facts ; and create a strong presumption in favor of the
contention of conservative scholars, for the early date
of the Pentateuch and other books of the Old Testa-
ment. The inscriptions on the monuments, especially
the discovery of the Tel-el-Marna tablets, has pre-
sented evidence to the existence of a degree of intelli-
gence and literary culture in Kgypt and Canaan,
long before the time of the Hebrew Exodus, which
supplies a refutation of the hypothesis to which I have
referred ; and deprived of force the arguments against
the early date of the Pentateuch, which have been
based upon the assumption that the literary and
religious condition of the time of Moses was too crude
to produce these writings.
The Rev. A. H. Sayce, LL.D., professor of Assyri-
ology in the University of Oxford, in his book, " The
Higher Critics and the Monuments," and in numerous
articles, has presented facts of the greatest interest
which throw a flood of light on this question. We
learn that the world by which the Hebrews were
surrounded, from the very dawn of their history, was
pre-eminently a writing and reading one. Dr. Sayce
says : " Long before the days of Moses, or even of
Abraham, the Egyptians and Babylonians were peoples
devoted to reading and writing ; books and schools
were multiplied among them, and libraries existed
filled with the literary treasures of the past." The
Tel-el-Marna discoveries are not mere inscriptions and
records, but correspondence on ordinary topics, show-
ing a wdde diflusion of the ability to read and write.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 79
Professor Sayce confidently says : " We now know
that not only Babylonian beliefs, but the literature
itself in which those beliefs were enshrined, had been
brought to Palestine before the age of Moses. We
also know that the beliefs which have left their traces
on the Biblical history of the fall of man had been
recorded in writing at a very early period." '"'
The Egyptians were not only a literary people at
this early period. Dr. Howard Osgood quotes Chabas
and Renouf as saying : " The recognised Egyptian
code of morals was a very noble and refined one.
None of the Christian virtues were forcrotten in it."
"Tlie Book of the Dead" goes far to justify this
testimony. Professor Sayce may well say : " To
admit that the Israelites were once in Egypt, and yet
deny them a knowledge of letters at the time they fled
from it, may be consonant with the principles of the
higher criticism ; it is certainly not consonant with
the principles of probability and common-sense." ^^
It is one of the strange anomalies of the higher
critics that they constantly assume, in order to meet
the emergencies of their evolutional theory, that the
Hebrews, whose religion possessed a Divine vitality
which has made it an undying and expanding moral
power in the world, were behind their heathen neigh-
bors in religious culture and general intelligence. The
" Ethical Monotheism," which Cheyne deems " too
daring " for Isaiah's time, was not the late evolution
which these critics imagine it to have been. To this
the Pentateuch is an irrefragable witness.
13 Page 106. " " Lex Mosaica," p. 11.
80 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
In summing up the results of recent discoveries
Professor Sayce says : " That primary assumption of
the late use of writing for literary purposes in Pales-
tine which, consciously or unconsciously, has done so
much to wreck the belief of the critics in the earlier
narratives of the Bible, has been shown to be utterly
false. The cuneiform inscriptions have restored the
historical credit of certain passages of the Pentateuch
which had been resolved into myth, and have demon-
strated the worthlessness of the arguments by which
their mythic character had been maintained. The
archaeology of Genesis seems to show that the literary
analysis of the book must be revised ; and that the
confidence with which one portion of a verse isassigned
to one author and another portion of it to another, is
a confidence begotten of the study of modern critical
literature and not of the literature of the past." ''
The early use of writing has been so incon testa bly
proved that it can no longer be denied ; yet critics
who cannot deny it still maintain theories that were
originated by men who based them on this false
assumption about the crude literary state of Mosaic
times.
Professor Sayce does not by any means stand alone.
Other eminent archa3logists hold similar views. Dr.
Fritz Hommel, Professor of SeniH.ic languages in the
University of Munich, distinguished both as an
Orientalist and an archaeologist, in his recent work
entitled, " Ancimt Hebrew Tradition as Illustrated by
the Monuments," takes a decided stand against the
i*"' " Higher Critics and the Monuments," p. 561.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 81
conclusions of the higher critics respecting .e date of
the Pentateuch. He rejects, as contrary to convincing
evidence, Wellhausen's unjust allegation, that the
personal names of the Mosaic period found in the
" Priests' Code " " had been deliberately manufactured
in later times, after an earlier pattern, and that their
testimony was consequently worthless." One main
purpose of Dr. Hommel's work is to show from con-
temporary inscriptions, " that even from the time of
Abraham onward personal names of the characteristi-
cally Mosaic type were in actual use among a section
of the Semites of Western Asia, and that it is useless
to talk any longer of a later post-Exilic invention." ^®
He maintains that Klosterman has conclusively
proved the absolute credibility of the biblical account
of the finding of the law in the time of Josiah, in a
way that " excludes the possibility of any such subtle
deception as that predicted by critics of the modern
school."
Dr. Hommel maintains that there is conclusive
proof that Deuteronomy was known to the prophet
Hosoa, and therefore cannot be a pious forgery of later
times. The similar name formations, and the striking
linouistic kinship shown to exist between the personal
names in the " Priests' Code " and the ancient Arabic
or Western Semitic names, and the evidence which this
affords of the antiquity of the Pentateuch, are a most
important feature of this acute and learned work. In
the preface Dr. Hommel uses these significant words :
^""Ancient Hebrew Tradition as Illustrated by the Monuments,"
p. 10.
6
82 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
" The monuments speak with no faltering tongue,
and already I seem to see signs of the approach of a
new era, in which men will be able to brush aside the
cobweb theories of the so-called "higher critics "of
the Pentateuch, and leaving such old-fashioned errors
behind them, attain to a clearer perception of the real
facts." ^^
Gaston Maspero, the great French Egyptologist, in
his recent work, " The Struggles of the Nations,
Egypt, Syria and Assyria," brings out important facts
respecting the times of the Patriarchs, which confirm
the Old Testament account. In spite of a marked
leaning to negative critical theories, he vindicates the
historical correctness of the account of the Exodus
and other parts of the early history, that the higher
critics have regarded as unreliable and mythical. His
view of the history of these early times bears strongly
against the assumption that they were times of ignor-
ance, in which no literary or religious work of value
could be produced.
It is very suggestive to note what slight evidence is
deemed sufficient by some critics for hypotheses that
lower the divine authority of the Bible. One example
of this disposition is seen in the ready acceptance of
the notion, that the Biblical accounts of Creation and
the Flood were borrowed by the Hebrv^ws from earlier
heathen legends. Certain advanced critics and their
ready disciples have taken for granted that any sign
of the influence of Babylonian thought, or what is
supposed to be such, in Genesis, must be ascribed to
^Ubid.,^. 12.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 83
the time of the Babylonian Exile, and be regarded as
a proof of the late date of that book.
Even if it were admitted that the accounts of
Creation and the Flood were borrowed from Baby-
lonian sources — which we do not believe — there are
unanswerably strong reasons for rejecting the con-
clusion that this borrowing took place at this late
period. The cuneiform tablets show that long before
the time of Moses, Palestine, though an Egyptian
province, was under the dominating influence of
Babylonian culture. The ancient Akkadians were
the founders of Babylonian civilization. Terah and
Abraham, the forefathers of the Hebrews, emigrated
from " Ur of the Chaldees " to Canaan. It is a
remarkable fact that recently Ur has been located ;
and as a result of excavations on its site, Akkadian
inscriptions, giving an account of its foundation, have
been discovered, which are probably among the most
ancient of all known historic records. Haran, where
Terah died, was under Babylonian influence.
In view of this early prevalence of Babylonian
influence in that region, Dr. Sayce is more than justi-
fied in maintaining, that there is no longer any need
of looking to the Babylonian Exile for an explanation
of what are regarded as the Babylonian ideas, sup-
posed to underlie the account of Creation in the first
chapter of Genesis. This also applies to the account
of the Flood. The incidents of that event were
known in Israel long before the Exile. The so-called
" Jehovist " document is admitted, even by higher
critics, to be much older than the Exile, and yet it
84 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
contains an account of this event. There is unanswer-
able force in this question of Professor McCurdy, of
Toronto University, in the Homiletic Review for
August, 1897 : " Is it possible that the Hebrew sacred
writers were so devoid of traditional or other records
relating to tlie beginning of things, that they had to
wait till they were brought into close contact witli
another people, in order to get a starting-point for
human history generally, or for their own national
history ? " Speaking of the institutions of Genesis
the same writer remarks : " It would re(iuire an inver-
sion of the whole history of the civil and religious life
of the Hebrews, to assume that these institutions were
acquired by them at the very close of their career as
a nation." Yet there are some so wedded to the notion
of late dates for all books of the Bible that, in spite
of the weighty considerations to the contrary, they
cling to the supposition that the Bible accounts of
Creation and the Flood were borrowed from a heathen
people at the time of the captivitj?".
Though Professor Sayce rejects tlie idea that the
accounts of Creation and the Flood in Genesis should
be assigned to the time of the Exile, he favors the
opinion that the account of these events is of Baby-
lonian origin. This view seems to be adopted chiefly
because of the resemblance between the account in
Genesis and the Babylonian poem, and what he deems
signs that the Bible writers were acquainted with it.
We confess we cannot see the force of Dr. Sayce's
curious argument, that " the silent correction of the
Babylonian polytheism is an eloquent testimony to the
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 85
writer's knowledge of the poem in which that poly-
tlieism was expressed." How the absence of all poly-
theistic ideas from the Bible account can be a testimony
to a knowledge of a source characterized by these
ideas, is certainly hard to understand. Would not the
presence of polytheistic ideas in Genesis be a stronger
ground for this claim ? Let any one, who has no
theory to support, peruse the Babylonian poem care-
fully, and it will not seem a feasible idea that the
account in Genesis was a borrowed development from
that rhapsody.
But the facts which Professor Sayce himself states,
respecting the contrasts and differences between the
two accounts, strongly support a contrary view. No
doubt, there are points of resemblance between the
Bible account and the Babylonian epic. This may
indicate a common origin ; but it does not settle the
question of priority or originality. The differences are
much more striking than the resemblances, as any one
will see who carefully compares the poem with the
Bible narrative.
Dr. Sayce fully admits this. He says : " The poly-
theism wliich underlies the one, with the thinly-veiled
materialism which overlies it, is not more profoundly
contrasted with the devout monotheism of the other,
than is the absolute want of mythological details in
Genesis with the cosmological myths embodied in the
cuneiform poem. We pass, as it were, from the Iliad
to sober history. Where the Assyrian or Babylonian
poet saw the action of deified forces of nature, the
Hebrew writer sees only the will of the supreme
86 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
God." '" After pointing out the central ideas of the
poem, he says : " Sucli ideas are tlie very reverse; of
those which inspire the narrative of Genesis." Again :
" While the Babylonian poem is intensely polytheistic,
the biblical narrative of the deluge is intensely mono-
theistic."
There was also a Babylonian Sabbath, of which some
claim that the Hebrew Sabbath was an imitation ;
but Professor Sayce points out several important
differences between the Hebrew and Babylonian Sab-
baths, which show them to be very different things.
The chief of these is, that " the Hebrew Sabbath is
entirely divorced from all connection with Babylonian
astronomy and the polytheistic worship with which
it was bound up." Does not the fact, that the main
idea of the Biblical records is the over-ruling govern-
ment of the one living and true God, vindicate their
claim to an originality to which the poem can lay no
claim ? The accounts in Genesis constitute a coherent
historic narrative. The Babylonian account is a
fantastic epic poem. Is it not more reasonable to
suppose that the poem was a fanciful expansion of
some of the facts in the Bible narrative on a polythe-
istic basis, by one who was a polytheist, than to sup-
pose that the coherent monotheistic narrative of
Genesis was extracted out of the Babylonian fantasia i
In other w^ords, we think when the simple and morally
elevated accounts in Genesis are compared with the
mythical and fantastic Babylonian epic, all unbiased
students will see good reason to admit that it is much
i« ♦' Higher Critics and the Monuments," p. 71.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 87
more likely that the simple and sijrnificant biblical
accounts are the orifrinals, and the Bab^^onian poems
corrupt versions of the same events, than that the
purer and loftier accounts in Genesis are merely the
Babylonian legends, purified and stript of their poly-
theistic superstitions, by some later Hebrew writer.
Prof. J. D. Davis, of Princeton, speaking of the
story of Creation, says : " The Hebrew account is the
intentional perpetuation of the basal doctrine of the
origin of the universe." Of the account of the Flood
in Genesis he says : " The Hebrew narrative, at least
as a whole, has not been derived from the cuneiform ;
the accounts are independent, save in their common
origin, For, be it observed, the Hebrew story is not
simply the cuneiform tale stript of its polytheism, but
a variant version ; for even after the removal of the
polytheistic elements, the stories conflict." '"
The Hebrews were no late creation. They had as
ancient a pedigree as any other people. There is no
reason to believe that the progenitors of the Hebrew
people were inferior in culture and knowledge to the
contemporary people of any other race. They were
as likely to possess historic and religious records as
any people of their time. Their possession of such
traditions did not depend upon their national organi-
zation. In view of the facts in the case, there is good
ground to admit what Professor McCurdy calls, " the
strength of the plea that Abram and his people may
have brought with them from their Babylonian home
the whole body of traditions from the Creation story
'^ "Genesis and Semitic Tradition," p. 120.
88 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
to that of Babel, which furnidhes the m^^terial of the
first eleven chapters of Genesis." Dr. Bissell says :
*' The elder Delitzsch used, in his classes, to express it
as his opinion that Abraham, when he entered Canaan,
brought with him from his Eastern home written as
well as oral narratives, covering the facts of the earlier
parts of Genesis.'"-"
Unlike those " scholars " who take every sign of
similarity between the Babylonian legends and Gene-
sis, as a positive proof of the late Exilic composition of
the parts of Genesis that bears these signs, the eminent
Orientalist, Professor Hommel of Munich, in the
learned work to which we have already referred,
maintains that the absence of late Babylonian and
Aramaic loan-words in the " Priest's Code " atlbrds a
strong argument for its early date. He shows that
words in these writings date back to the early Baby-
lonian period, and belong to a totally different cate-
gory from the neo- Babylonian wort which occur in
Ezekiel. He also has been led to conclude that " by
his migration from Chaldea, Abraham's higher and
purer creed was preserved from absorption into the
Babylonian polytheism, a fate which must have in-
evitably befallen it." Dr. Hommel forcibly maintains
that " a people with such a past religious history as
the children of Israel, would certainly have no need to
rely on the subjugated peoples of Palestine for
accounts of the Creation, the Fall, the Deluge, and
their early progenitors." Referring to the Bible
account of Creation he says : '' I now no longer
20 "Genesis in Colors," p. viii.
IMAGINARY HISTORIC CONDITIONS. 89
HESITATE TO SAY, THAT THE MONOTHEISTIC CONCEPTION
OF THE BIBLICAL TEXT, AND ESPECIALLY THE ' PrIESTLY
Code,' must, compared with the polytheistic ver-
sion, BE REGARDED AS THE ORIGINAL.'"''^
Professor McCurdy has gone over this question very
thoroughly in his articles in the Humilctic Review.
After giving all due consideration to the arguments
for contrary conclusions, his judgment is, that the
balance of probability is in favor of those early
accounts coming through Abram. There is great force
in his remark : " The Hebrew record stands independ-
ently as a part of a great work of the national litera-
ture, and we can only concede that the material has
been taken immediately from outside the Hebrew
realm, when forced to that conclusion by evidence
that satisfies all the conditions." No such evidence
has been produced. It goes far to prove that a partial
bias to the speculations of the day, rather than sound
scholarship, is the cause of the ready acceptance of the
anti-biblical view, that some who regard themselves as
Christian scholars accept that view, without " evidence
that satisfies all the conditions." The late Prof. E.
C. Biasell forcibly says : " He who believes that God
revealed Himself to primitive man as one God, as the
Bible tells us, will be likely to see in the Akkadian
story a polytheistic corruption of an original mono-
theistic account, and as such strongly confirmatory of
the historicity of Genesis."^ We have dwelt upon
this theory at some length, because it is one of the
21" Ancient Hebrew Tradition," p. 310.
^2" Genesis in Colors," p. xiv.
90 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
rationalist ways of disparaging tlie Hebrew Scriptures,
and undermining their inspiration and authority.
It is significant that the import of tliese discoveries
of ancient literature has been so generally ignored by
the higher critics. Professor Driver and some others
have, indeed, made the most of any concessions of the
archfeologists which favor any of their theories. But
the fact that on some points they agree with the
critics vindicates their independence, and gives greater
weight to their statements against them. It is certain
the radical critics have not fairly faced the conse-
quences of the facts, in their bearing on the critical
assumptions by which late dates for the Pentateuch
and the Psalms have been advocated. Professor
Osgood says : " Both Driver and Cornill imagine a
state of society and religion, before the age of David,
that is in blank contradiction to the facts shown by
the monuments. . . . But if these results are true, as
the monuments prove, on what ground can these critics
justify their complete silence and exclusion of all this
testimony to the conditioning environment of the Old
Testament ? The Old Testament can no longer be
fairly treated under conceptions of history that are
antiquated, and denied by the monuments of every
museum in Europe. The new view of ancient history
must come in and be made a part of the problem.
And when that occurs the foundations of the theory
of these * Introductions ' (Driver s and Cornill's) will
pass away with the rushing stream as sand with the
flood.""
23 Bihliotheca Sacra, July, 1893.
nfAGLWARY fflSTORIC CONDITIONS. 91
Ah regards the inferences based upon supposed
literary conditions at certain times, Dr. Sayce truly
says : " The critic has made his own ignorance the
measure of the credibility of an ancient document."
With reference to religion, we have no means of
knowing the religious condition of the people of
Israel except the Old Testament. To substitute an
imaginary condition of things for its testimony is
utterly unscientific. It is blamable enough to base
destructive negative conclusions upon an imaginary
condition of things, of the existence of which there is
no evidence ; Vjut it is still worse to keep on building
on hypotheses that have been shown to be contrary to
the historic facts.
CHAPTER VI.
UNWARRANTED CONCLUSIONS BASED
ON ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE.
Partial Statements of Higher Critics — Neglect of Mosaic Laws
Accounted For — Historians and Prophets Refer to Penta-
teuchal History and Rites — Conclusive Testimony of Amos
Hosea, and Later Prophets — The Facts not Fairly Met by
the Higher Critics.
THE chief argument in support of the theory that
Deuteronomy and the Levitical laws are late
productions, and not as they assume to be of Mosaic
origin and authority, is the alleged silence of the
historic and early prophetic books respecting the laws
and ritual observances contained in these parts of the
Pentateuch, and their non-observance by the people.
The higher critics declare that there is no evidence in
these books that the laws in Deuteronomy were known
before the time of King Josiah, or that the laws and
ritual in the so-called " Priests' Code " were known
and observed till after the Babylonian Exile.
The late Prof. Robertson Smith says : " The theology
of the prophets before Ezekiel has no place for the
system of priestly sacrifice and ritual." On the
strength of these alleged silences, this school of critics
hold that they are justified in asserting that these
92
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 93
writings are not Mosaic either in time or authorship ;
but that they were written at late dates by unknown
authors, the laws being placed in a fictitious historic
setting adapted to make the impression that they were
Mosaic.
Even if the references to the laws of Moses were as
scanty as the critics try to make out, this would not
prove that there were no such laws in existence.
Neither prophet nor historian would dwell on what
did not concern his main purpose. The Mosaic origin
of the laws was not questioned, and did not need to
be vindicated. The history in the Old Testament is
brief and incomplete, and therefore not likely to refer
to all that took place in these times. In other national
histories the most common usages are taken for granted.
Their very commonness often causes the omission of
specific mention of them. Besides, every one knows
that the neglect of the Mosaic laws is fully accounted
for without assuming their non-existence, by the fre-
quent statements respecting their non-observance and
violation in times of religious degeneracy, when the
people conformed to the idolatrous ways of their
heathen neighbors. This was the common complaint
of the prophets. Elijah was disheartened, " because,"
as he said, " the children of Israel have forsaken thy
covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy
prophets with the sword." (1 Kings xix. 14.)
Have we not seen something very similar to this
silence in Christian history ? Luther's ignorance of
the Bible, though a priest, indicates very general
ignorance. According to the reasoning of the higher
94 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
critics, the general ignorance of the Bible before the
Reformation, and especially before the invention of
printing, might be taken as a proof that the Scriptures
were then unknown. The neglect of a law does not
prove it unknown or non-existent. Not more being
said about the priests or priestly ritual by the pro-
phets, may be accounted for by the fact that the priests
were often corrupt, and the Levitical services at times
associated with heathen customs which made them
obnoxious to the prophets. Their writings plainly
show that such prophets as Amos, Hosea, Micah and
Isaiah, were reformers, who called back the people of
Israel to forms of religious worship from which they
had fallen. The idolatrous worship in the high places
was adopted in imitation of the heathen p^^oples
around them, and was not their historic religion.
But the necessities of the evolutionary theory com-
pel its advocates to assume, in spite of the facts, that
these prophets were revolutionists, introducing a new
religion instead of the popular religion of the people.
Prof. Robertson Smith regarded it as demonstrated,
that the priestly legislation in the Pentateuch did not
exist before the Exile — " that it can no longer be dis-
puted that the ideas of the prophets do not pre-sup-
pose those of the priestly parts of the Pentateuch."
Dr. Driver says: "The pre-Exilic period shows no
indication of the legislation of P. (Priests' Code) being
in operation."^ Stade ascribed the merit of the rise
of monotheistic religion to " the prophetic movement
and the result of the political fortunes of the people."
» '♦ Introduction," p. 29.
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 95
Wellhausen, speaking of Elijah the prophet, says :
" To him first was it revealed that we have not in the
various departments of nature a variety of forces
worthy of worship ; but that there exists over all but
one Holy One and one Mighty One, who reveals Him-
self not in nature, but in law and righteousness in the
world of man." 2 Professor Toy says : "In the period
of the Judges He (Jehovah) is to Israel what Kemosh
is to Ammon." Such views seem to eliminate Moses
and his work from the history. According to Well-
hausen, " Amos was the founder and the purest type
of a new phase of prophecy," and it is alleged that
these early writing prophets, in their introduction of
the movement against the earlier religion of the
people, were influenced by " ethical motives, which
manifested themselves in them for the first time in
history."
Unless these assertions can be justified by sober
historical criticism of the Old Testament writings,
they are of no weight. Assertions that a certain
prophet was the first to teach some religious truth, if
they have nothing to sustain them but the conjectures
of partial critics, can only be regarded as assumptions
rendered necessary to help out opinions that require
their support. Our ignorance of the condition of
things at any past period cannot justify the fabri-
cation of an imaginary history, in harmony with our
particular notions or speculations.
The alleged silences concerning the laws contained
in the Pentateuch, on which the radical critics Jiave
« '• History of Israel," p. 462.
96 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
built so largely, lue emphatically deny. On the con-
trary, it has been conclusively proved that there are in
the historic and prophetic books of the Old Testament,
just such references to the Mosaic laws and to the
history contained in the Pentateuch, as we would
expect to find if the Bible conception of the history be
true ; but which are not consistent with the late dates
required by the evolutionist theory. The fact that
these references are mainly implied and incidental
makes them stronger as evidence than if they were
more direct and designed. Where the references are
most explicit, the higher critics say they were made
for a purpose, and reject them.
The best presentation of the argument from the
testimony of the prophets is that by Prof. James
Robertson, in his " Early Religion of Israel." Dr.
Harman's essay in " Moses and His Recent Critics ; "
Dr. Sharpe's essay on " The Northern Kingdom," in
" Lex Mosaica ; " an article in the Nashville Methodist
Review for March, 1897, by Dr. Newton, of Japan ;
and a series of articles in the Bihliotheca Sacra, by
Dr. Hayman of England, also ably present the argu-
ment from the early prophets, in refutation of the
hypothesis that the teaching of Amos, Hosea and
Micah was a new religion, different from the historic
religion of the people of Israel.
Inasmuch as the higher critics deny the reliability
of the historic books of the Old Testament, though not
accepting their view, yet in order to find common
ground for a starting point. Professor Robertson takes
Amos and Hosea, the earliest writing prophets, and
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 97
examines the evidence they present in favor of the
Mosaic origin of the early religion of Israel. It is
admitted on all hands that these prophecies are genu-
ine, and that they were written at least early in the
eighth century, B.C., long before the dates which have
been assigned to Deuteronomy or the " Priests' Code "
by the higher critics. A thorough and critical exam-
ination of these two prophetic books conclusively
shows the following facts : That these prophets were
reformers, and not revolutionists ; that they do not
assume to be introducing a new religion ; that they
are calling the people back to the observance of the
divine laws they had neglected and broken ; that they
refer to prophetic men who had preceded them and
taught the same truths ; that they evidently refer to
Mosaic laws and ordinances, which the critics ask us
to believe were the productions of much later times ;
that " they pre-suppose for the nation of Israel a cer-
tain religious standing, which rests on an antecedent
history to which they poi itedly and repeatedly refer."
We cannot give even an outline of Dr. Robertson's
work. It is not, however, too much to say, that it
fully justifies the confidence which the author expresses
in the preface, when he says : " I believe a sober and
unprejudiced criticism will show that Israel, at the
dawn of its national existence, had a very exalted
conception of God and a high rule of duty ; and that
these things were neither borrowed from their neigh-
bors nor excogitated by themselves."^
The volume of evidence which the Old Testament
7 ' Page xii.
98 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
furnishes on this branch of the subject is large and
very convincing. We can only give a brief outline of
the reasons for believing that these prophecies were
not a new religion, as the higher critics allege, and a
few illustrations, selected out of the many references
in the earlier prophets and historic books, to the
Mosaic laws and early history of Israel.
The language of a people fairly indicates their
position in the scale of civilization and progress. It
is admitted that there are no signs of crudeness about
the language of Amos and Hosea. The literary style
is not such as indicates the beginning of a literary
period. Professor Robertson says: " The style of Amos
and Hosea is already as good as the Hebrew ever
attained." Even Prof. Robertson Smith says : " To
the unprejudiced judgment, the prophecy of Amos
appears one of the best examples of pure Hebrew
style."* Dr. Driver bears similar testimony to the
style of Amos. Of Hosea he says : " The style is
compressed and forceful." Such literary productions
suppose readers of intelligence and culture, capable
of understanding what was addressed to them. These
prophecies are evidently in succession to an earlier
religious literature, of which the people had some know-
ledge. The references in the historic books to books
which have not come down to us prove this. Three
hundred years before this time, " Samuel told the
people the manner of the kingdom, and wrote it in a
book, and laid it up before the Lord." (1 Samuel x. 25.)
This long interval was not a literary blank, as these
critics assume.
* " Prophets of Israel," p. 125.
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 99
The religious teaching of Amos and Hosea presents
lofty ideas of God's character and human duty, and
pre-supposes a high degree of religious intelligence in
the people to whom they addressed their messages.
They give no sign that " ethical monotheism " was a
novel idea. There is nothing in the prophecies of
either of these prophets which indicates that they are
asking the people to give up an ancient historic
religion for a new one. There is no mystery or in-
consistency in their condemnation of the worship in
the high places in Bethel, Dan and Gilgal, which never
had Divine approval, or prophetic sanction. Accord-
ing to Hosea (x. 8) these high places were " the sin of
Israel." But Wellhausen holds that they were the
authorized religious worship. He calls them "Jehovah's
favorites." He says : " It was Amos, Hosea and
Isaiah who introduced the movement against the old
popular worship of the high places."
The history in the books of Kings, so far as it refers
to this period, confirms the picture which these pro-
phets give of the religious condition of the people.
Because there is no account of the condemnation of
the high places by Elijah, no one is justified in assum-
ing that he approved of them, no more than that Isaiah
approved of them. Hosea and Amos never speak as
if Israel had been formerly taught to regard Jehovah
as a mere tribal god, like Chemosh or Moloch. He is
the Creator of all things. The people are exhorted to
" seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion."
(Amos V. 8.) Though the first words of Amos are,
*' The Lord shall roar from Zion, and utter His voice
100 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
from Jerusalem," yet the threatened judgments that
follow are against other nations as well as Ephraim
and Judah, showing that He rules over all, It is " He
that formeth the mountains and createth the wind,
and declare th unto man what is his thought" (iv. 13).
He is essentially holy (iv. 2.) The ways of Jehovah
are right. (Hosea xiv. 9.) In Him the fatherless find
mercy, (xiv. 3.) He has no pleasure in formal rites.
(Amos V. 21-24.) He desires " mercy and not sacrifice,
and the knowledge of God more than burnt oflferings."
(Hosea vi. 6.) Though His anger is kindled because
of their wickedness, yet He says : " I will not execute
the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to de-
stroy Ephraim ; for I am God and not man." (Hosea
xi. 9.) When we find critics declaring that any Psalm
containing lofty ideas of God and righteousness could
not have been written in such times as those of Hosea,
Amos and Isaiah, but must be assigned to the critics'
post- Exilic golden age, it is impossible to resist the
conviction, that we see in such assumptions an illus-
tration of the warping power of a pre-conceived
theory, to which everything must be made to yield.
The evidence is overwhelming that Amos and
Hosea regarded the people of Israel and Judah, to
whom they addressed their admonitions and warnings,
as backslidden peoples who had forsaken God's ordi-
nances and broken his laws, by adopting semi-heathen-
ish forms of worship. The northern kingdom had
sinned worse than Judah, but both are called back to
the old Mosaic religion. If the prophets and the
people both knew that the worship which these pro-
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 101
phets condemned was the authorized historic religion,
how could the people be justly blamed and threatened
with divine punisliment for not observing laws of
which, according to the higher critics, they had no
knowledge ? The prophets must have been confident
that the people would recognize the truth of their
charges, or they would not have made them.
The threatenings of punishment which Amos de-
livered against the heathen peoples were for deeds of
cruelty and wrong ; but Judah's punishment is not to
be turned away, *' because they have despised the law
of the Lord, and have not kept His commandments,
and their lies caused them to err, after the which their
fathers walked." (ii. 4.) There departure from God is
repeatedly characterized as spiritual whoredom. " For
the land hath committed great whoredom, departing
from the Lord." (Hosea i. 2.) Samaria is to be
punished, " because she hath rebelled against her God."
(xiii. 16.) Again and again the complaint is made,
" Yet ye have not returned unto me, saith the Lord,"
implying that by their corrupt worship they had for-
saken God. Referring to Israel as the covenant people,
Jehovah says : '* You only have I known of all the
families of the earth." (iii. 12.) Because of their for-
saking God, Israel is threatened with a famine — " not
a famine of bread or thirst for water, but of hearing
the words of the Lord"(viii. 11), which clearly im-
plies that they had previously been blest wuth the
privilege of hearing His words in prophetic teaching,
without improving the opportunity. The words in
Hosea viii. 1, "Because they have transgressed my
102 THE BIIiLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
covenant and trespassed against my law," liave an
evident reference to the Mosaic legislation. Hosea
says : " Israel hath cast oft' the thing that is good."
(viii. o.) But if Israel was observing the ancient
religion, as the higher critics say, from what had the
people fallen away ? God says by the prophet : " My
people are destroyed for lack of knowledge ; because
thou hast rejected knowledge, I also will reject thee,
that thou shalt be no priest to me, seeing thou hast
forgotten the law of thy God." (iii. 6.) This clearly
implies that there were laws which it was the priest's
duty to teach to the people. In Hosea viii. 1 2, a code
of written laws is expressly referred to, "I have
written unto him (Ephraim) the great things of my
law (Torah), but they were counted as a strange
thing." An attempt has been made to break the force
of this passage by explaining it as a hypothetical
statement. But Delitzsch, Orelli, Smend and Harman
interpret it in the past tense, as the sense and con-
nection require. It plainly refers to a written law,
which must have contained codes of worship as well
as moral precepts, else the condemned worship of
Ephraim could not be a violation of them.
There is also in these prophets distinct references to
previous prophetic teachers, whose similar warnings
and counsels had been disregarded. Hosea represents
Jehovah as saying : " Therefore have I h ewedthem
by the prophets ; I have slain them by the words of
my mouth." (vi. 5.) "I have also spoken by the
prophets, and I have multiplied visions, and used
similitudes by the ministry of the prophets." (xii. 10.)
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 103
Similarly Amos represents God as saying to Israel :
"And I raised up of your sons for prophets, and of your
young men for Nazarites." (ii. 11.) If these former
prophets had not condemned the same sins and en-
joined the same religious duties as Hosea and Amos,
there would be no point in blaming the people for
rejecting their teaching.
The incidental references in Hosea and Amos to
events in the early history of the Hebrews, which are
recorded in the Pentateuch and other historic books
that the critics declare to be late evolutions, furnish
convincing evidence that these prophets and the
people of their times had a knowledge of the history
contained in these early books. We have in these
writings of the ninth century, B.C., references to the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Amos i v. 12);
the birth of Jacob and Esau (Hosea xii. 3) ; Jacob
wrestling with the Angel (Hosea xii. 4) ; Jacob's ser-
vice with Laban (Hos. xii. 12); the Exodus from
Egypt and the forty years in the wilderness (Amos
ii. 10) ; Israel joining himself to Baalpeor (Hos. ix. 10) ;
the wickedness of the Gibeonites (Hos. ix. 9); the
giving of Saul as king to Israel (Hos. xiii. 11);
David's making musical instruments (Amos vi. 5) ;
and " the songs of the temple " (viii. 3). It is a signi-
ficant fact, that " Amos and Hosea are found to hold
essentially, for the period succeeding Moses, the same
scheme of history, which is by modern critics pro-
nounced to be late and unhistorical."
Still more significant are the direct references by
these prophets to Mosaic laws and rites, of which the
104 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
accounts are given in those parts of the Pentateucli,
which the critics say were written by unknown
authors long after the time of Amos and Hosea. Only
a few examples can be given. In Hosea ii. 11 we
read, " I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her
feast days, her new moons and her Sabbaths, and all
her solemn feasts," which manifestly refers to the
institutions of the Pentateuch, some of which Israel
mixed with heathen customs in the worship of the
high places. In chapter xii. 9, Hosea speaks of the
Feasti of Tabernacles, referring to Leviticus xxiii. 42,43,
where the dwelling in booths is enjoined. '* Their
sacrifices shall be to them as the bread of mourners,
all that eat thereof shall be polluted." (ix. 4.) In this
there is a reference to Deuteronomy xxvi. 14. In
Deuteronomy viii., we read; "Lest when thou hast
eaten and are full. . . . Then thy heart be lifted up and
thou forget the Lord thy God," etc. In Hosea xii. 6,
God is represented by the prophet as saying : " They
were filled and their heart was exalted, therefore have
they forgotten me." Is there not here a direct refer-
ence to Deuteronomy ?
In Amos ii. 11, it is said, "But ye gave the
Nazarites wine to drink," which assumes their know-
ledge of the law of the Nazarites contained in Numbers
vi. " Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your
meat offerings, I will not accept them, neither will I
regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts." (v. 22.)
This evidently refers to the offerings enjoined in the
Mosaic law. " Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with
leaven" (iv. 5.), undoubtedly refers to Leviticus (vii.
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 105
18), where the worshipper is directed to offer " leavened
bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace
offering."
But we are under no obligation to confine ourselves
to the evidence afforded by Amos and Hosea on this
(question. Micah and Isaiah wrote only a little later
than these prophets, and they also gave evidence of
the same knowledge of the laws recorded in the
Pentateuch. As already remarked, the fact that these
references to the law are mostly incidental and indi-
rect makes their testimony the stronger ; for they
assume that the people know that there were divine
rules of life, and an order of worship which they had
neglected. Isaiah, speaking of those who undertake
to teach the people, says : " To the law and to the
testimony ; if they speak not according to this word,
there is no morning for them." (Isa. viii. 20.) Again :
" They have cast away the law of the Lord of Hosts."
(v. 24.) Micah, one of the early writing prophets, refers
to the deliverance from Egypt, to Balaam's answer to
Balak ; and the law of life given in Micah, vi. 8, is evidently
based on Deuteronomy x. 12. The book of Joshua,
which presents strong evidence of being a true history,
and not a fictitious supplement to Deuteronomy, re-
peatedly refers to the book of the law of Moses, and
to the promises made to the great prophet as recorded
in the Pentateuch. Even in the book of Judges, in
which the history is so brief and fragmentary, there
are several clear references to the Mosaic laws. In
both Joshua and Judges there are records of several
things done, which were in accord with laws in
106 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Deuteronomy, and can only be accounted for as being
done in obedience to these laws.
The contention that before Josiah's time the high
places were authorized places of worship, and that the
law of central worship in Deuteronomy was a new
rule, which shows the book to be a late production
has not been supported by any adequate proof. The
law recorded in Exodus xx. 24, is not really at vari-
ance with the law of central worship in Deuteronomy
xii. 11. In both the thought is that the worship is to
be in the place that God chooses. The law of central
worship was known and observed long before Josiah's
time. Was not Solomon's temple a place of central
worship 300 years before the time of Josiali ? If
Deuteronomy was written at the date assigned to it
by most of the higher critics, why does it contain no
reference to the temple service or to Shiloh ? If there
had been no knowledge that central worship had been
enjoined by Moses, why were the children of Israel
angry with Reuben and Gad and the half tribe of
Manasseh, for building another altar on their side of
Jordan, " besides the altar of the Lord our God that
was before his tabernacle. (See Joshua xxii.) As
Professor Strack points out, " the command which the
Book of the Covenant also lays down to appear three
times a year before the Lord (Exodus xxiii. 17),
decidedly points to a centralization of the worship."
In Judges xviii. 31, we read of " the house of God at
Shiloh," which we learn from Samuel ii. 22 meant
the " Tabernacle of the Congregation." In Judges
xxi. 19, mention is made of a " feast of the Lord in
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 107
Shiloh yearly." In Jeremiah vii. 12 God speaks of
" my place which was in Shiloh where I set my name
at the first." In Judges xx. 28, we are told that
Phinehas, the grandson of Aaron, stood before the
ark of the covenant in those days. It is evident from,
these historic records that Shiloh was a central place
of worship, and that the " Tabernacle of the Congre-
gation " was a historic reality, and not a fiction, as the
higher critics maintain.
In the 17th chapter of 2nd Kings the writer, refer-
ring to the period before the Assyrian captivity,
mentions among the sins of Israel which caused God's
anger against them, that " they built them high places
in all their cities," and that " they burnt incense in all
the high places, as did the heathen whom the Lord
carried away before them." And before the time
when it is alleged Deuteronomy was produced we are
told that Hezekiah "removed the high places." (2
Kings xviii. 4.) And yet the higher critics assume
it to be an unquestionable fact, that there was no law
or established usage of central worship, before the
18th year of Josiah's reign, in order to support the
theory that Deuteronomy was a late production.
There is good ground to believe that the instances
of offering sacrifices in different places, which are
quoted by the higher critics as evidence against the
idea of an obligation for a central place of worship,
were exceptional either as to the occasion or the
character of the persons, such as Samuel, Gideon, and
Manoah. Samuel sacrificing at Mizpah and Ramah,
and not at Shiloh, has been accounted for by the ark
108 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
of God being taken by the Philistines, which caused
the law of the central sanctuary to be held in abey-
ance for a time. It is the heathenish character of the
worship in the high places, rather than offering wor-
ship apart from the central sanctuary, that is so
strongly condemned by prophets and historians.
It is alleged by the critics that according to Deut-
eronomy all the Levites were priests, and that the
division of nriests and Levites in the " Priests' Code "
JL
was a new order, which proves that part of the
Pentateuch to be of late date. This is mainly built
on the supposition that the words, "the priests, the
Levites," in Deuteronomy imply that all the Levites
were priests. Wellhausen says: "The distinction
between priest and Levite, which Ezekiel introduces
and justifies as an innovation, according to the Priestly
Code has always existed." He is here referring to
the degradation of the Levites, in Ezekiel's vision,
who had ministered at the high places. The Rev.
F. E. Spencer, in his essay on "Ezekiel and the Priestly
School," shows that this conclusion is based on a
wrong interpretation of the words, " to do the office
of a priest unto me." After stating that the Levites
were "assistant priests," Mr. Spencer shows that
"the Levites are in the visionary Temple degraded
because of their original defilement, not from the
distinct duties of the priests of Aaron's line, which
they never rightly had, but from their near associa-
tion with the priests proper in representative
worship to less honorable functions." Are not the
historic references to Eleazer, Phinehas, Eli and
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 109
Zadok evidence that the office of high priest was no
late distinction ? In 2 Chronicles (xxx. 10) we read
that the priests and Levites "stood in their place
after their manner, according to the law of Moses the
man of God." Tnis is said of the time of Hezekiah,
long before the time assigned to the " Priests' Code,"
in which it is said this distinction is introduced.
This alone disproves the critics' supposition, unless it
be regarded as false on that account. It has been
forcibly said: "The theory of Judaism must be
scjuared with its acknowleged records, not the acknow-
ledged records with the theory." The argument based
on the supposed difference respecting priests and
Levites. in Deuteronomy and the Levitical ritual, is
another illustration of drawing large conclusions
from doubtful premises.
Our space will allow us to give only a few of the
passages from the historic books, the Psalms, and the
later prophets, which plainly show that the history
and laws of the Pentateuch were known to the people
of Israel. Psalms that eminent Hebrew scholars
assign to David make as much reference to Penta-
teuchal facts and laws as those that are assigned to
post- Exilic times. In the 18th Psalm, which even
such German critics as De Wette, Schrader, Hitzig
and Ewald admit to be by David, the psalmist says:
" For all His judgments were before me, and I did
not put away His statutes from me." " Judgment "
and " Statutes " are Pentateuchal terms.
But the later books have also important testimony
to the same truth. The evidence they present does
110 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
not warrant any one in assuming that the references
to the law, in Jeremiah and the later prophets and
latest Psalms, are to books manufactured under false
pretences in the way the critics have imagined.
Whatever may be the date of such Psalms as the
19th, the 1st, and 119th, their godly writers mani-
festly cherish a profound conviction of the divine
authorship of the " law of the Lord" and the "statutes
of the Lord," of which they speak so reverently. It
is impossible to reconcile their devout language with
the idea that Deuteronomy and the other laws of the
Pentateuch were mainly the work of designing priests
and unknown redactors.
The prophet Ezekiel, who lived in the time of the
Exile, is assumed by Kuenen and Wellhausen to have
been the real father and designer of the Levitical
system, which it is alleged Ezra and other priests
completed at a later time. But in the 20th chapter
of his prophecy Ezekiel delivers the message which
God gave him for the elders of Israel. It consists of
a review of God's dealings with Israel in bringing
them out of Egypt, and rebukes of their ingratitude
in despising the statutes and judgments He had given
them. He says : " I caused them to go forth out of
the land of Egypt, and brought them into the wilder-
ness. And I gave them my statutes and shewed
them my judgments, which if a man do he shall even
live in them." Here the very words of Leviticus
(xviii. 5) are quoted. Can any one, who is not
warped by prejudice, believe for a moment that the
prophet here refers to some recently concocted laws
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. HI
in which he himself had a hand ? or to anything but
the Mosaic laws and statutes ?
The same question may be fitly asked respecting
the explicit references to the laws of Moses in Ezra
and Nehemiah. In these books we have such lan-
guage as the following : "And builded the altar of
the Lord God of Israel to offer burnt offerings
thereon, as it is written in the laws of Moses, the man
of God," (Ezra iii. 2.) " And they set the priests in
their divisions, and the Levites in their courses, for
the service of God, which is at Jerusalem ; as it is
written in the book of Moses." (vi. 18). In Nehe-
iniali we read : " So they read in the book, in the law
of God." (viii. 8.) '* And they found written in the
law which the Lord had commanded by Moses, that
the children of Israel should dwell in booths in the
feast of the seventh month." (viii. 14.) " And com-
mandedst them precepts, statutes and laws by the
hand of Moses thy servant." (ix. 14.) "The people
covenanted to walk in God's law, which was given by
Moses the servant of God." (x. 29.) These are direct
references to Pentateuchal laws, which were then
complete. Not only Nehemiah, but Ezra, to whom
the completion of the Levitical system is ascribed
by the critics, repeatedly attributes the laws
to which they conformed their worship to Moses.
Did these holy men mislead the people, in calling
these ordinances the laws of Moses ? How was it
possible to make the people universally believe that
these were the laws of Moses, if they were not really
such ? Men must be strongly predisposed to believe,
112 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
who accept such an unreasonable hypothesis as truth.
Are we to believe that Ezra knew the Tabernacle was
a late invention, and concealed this from the people ?
The great scholar Franz Delitzsch says : " We hold it
as absolutely inconceivable that the Elohistic portions
about the Tabernacle and its furniture should be an
historic fiction of the post-Exilic age."
Malachi, the latest of the Hebrew prophets, among
his closing words represents the Lord of Hosts as say-
ing, " Remember ye the law of Moses, my servant, which
I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with
the statutes and judgments," (Mai. iv. 4.) It was
manifestly the firm belief of this inspired prophet,
that the Pentateuch was what the Jewish and Christ-
ian churches through the ages have held it to be, and
not the evolved patch-work which the higher critics
assert that it is. The references of the prophets to
the history and laws in the Pentateuch are just what
we would expect, from what we know of the history
of the people of Israel and the character and mission
of the prophets. No one, who had not a theory to
maintain, would deny that there is overwhelming
evidence that the Pentateuchal laws and history
were known to the people of Israel, long before the
time at which the higher critics say they were written.
Well may Professor Sayce say : " It is strange how pre-
conceived theories will cause the best scholars to close
their eyes to obvious facts."
It may be asked : How do the critics meet all this
evidence ? It is assumed by them that these refer-
ences refer to oral traditions or brief ancient
ALLEGED SILENCES OF SCRIPTURE. 113
laws and customs, which at later times were
made the basis of the expanded legislation in the
Pentateuch. This admission of some foundation germs
seems to be made to conciliate opponents, who com-
plain of what has been expunged. It has no historic
foundation on which to rest. Those who reject, as
false, the account of the origin of these laws given in
the Pentateuch itself, have no right to substitute in
its place an imaginary history of their origin, of
which there is no evidence. Those who reject the
Scripture account, " go blindly groping along the cen-
turies in search of authors." In any other case,
similar references to a known book, not only to facts,
but to laws, usages, and characteristic expressions,
would be accepted as satisfactory proof of a know-
ledge of such a work. But these critics are against
the facts, because the facts are against them.
Passages in Isaiah, Hosea and Jeremiah, in which
Jehovah declares his aversion to the sacrifices of the
wicked and hypocritical are cited by Prof. Robertson
Smith and other critics, as a proof that sacrifices are
condemned by the prophets, and are contrary to God's
will and without his authority. This is not justifiable.
It is the way in which the sacrifices are offered and
the character of the offerers that are condemned. This
is seen from the fact that prayer and Sabbath obser-
vance are embraced in the stime condemnation. The
words in Hosea vi. 6, " I desire mercy and not sacri-
fice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt
offerings," shows it is not a prohibition of sacrifice
that is meant. When St. Paul says, " For Christ sent
8
114 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
me not to baptise, but to preach the Gospel" (1 Cor.
i. 17), he does not mean to reject Christian Baptism.
It is very inconsistent for these critics to maintain
that Isaiah and other great prophets condemned all
sacrifices, and then to represent Ezekiel and Ezra as
establishing as Mosaic and divine the forms of wor-
ship, which, according to the critical theory, Jehovah
had forbidden. In the later Psalms, in what Prof.
Robertson Smith calls the "Service Book of the Second
Temple," when the sacrificial ritual was in full use,
similar expressions exalting spiritual worship, and
disparaging sacrifice occur. But from these the critics
do not draw the same conclusions as they draw
from the statements in the prophets. Everyone
knows that where a Christian preacher exalts spirit-
ual religion and condemns trusting to rites and formal
ceremonies, it should not be taken as proof that he
condemns the sacraments and Christian ordinances.
But the higher critics evidently feel that these
replies do not meet the necessities of their theory.
They are forced to boldly assume that the references
to the Mosaic laws, not in harmony with their scheme,
are interpolations of redactors or partisan writers,
made in the interests of the priests. In other words,
they deny that there is any reference to Pentateuchal
laws and history in the prophets and historic books,
after they have expunged distinct references which
contradict their critical theories. Some examples of
this practice will be given in a succeeding chapter.
" chapter vil
questionable methods of higher
critics — " the ca noniza tion of
conjecture:'
Miscalled Scientific Criticism — A Preconceived Theory of Evo-
lution Determines Conclusions — Theories Built on Mere
Conjecture — Wellhausen on the Chronicles — Gratuitous
Creation of Redactors — Thoughts Suggested by These
Methods — Adverse Statements of Biblical Scholars.
A GREAT deal is said in some quarters about the
"scientific" methods of modern critics. It is
commonly assumed that the methods used are a
guaranty for the correctness of their conclusions.
Some writers seem to think that when they declare
that they have used " scientific " modes of studying
the Bible, this should silence all objections. But if
"science is knowledge gained and verified by exact
observation and correct thinking," the methods of
some of the leading higher critics have no just claim
to be called scientific.
In spite of their claims to superior critical modes of
study, prominent critics, in advocating their dis-
tinguishing views, practice methods of proof which
would not be tolerated in any ordinary literary
115
116 THE lilBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
or scientific discussion. Unproved assertions, theo-
retical conjectures, appeals to the authority of partial
critics, assumptions that verbal difference of style
proves different authors and dates, niagnifyinj^ the
significance of trivial things that appear to favor their
views, and the arbitrary rejection of whatever in
Scripture is against their preconceived theory, are
unpleasantly prominent where one has a right to ex-
pect attested facts and logical arguments.
The learning, ability and sincerity of many of these
critics may be freely admitted ; but these qualities do
not bestow freedom from partial feeling, or give that
judicial sobriety of judgment which is essential to
arriving at true conclusions on grave and difficult
questions, such as are embraced in the critical study
of the Scriptures.
The radical error of the rationalist critics — the key
of their whole scheme and methods — is found in their
practice of adjusting everything to the preconceived
theory that the Scriptures are the product of evolu-
tion, like other ethnic religions. Some indeed admit
that this has taken place under divine supervision;
but the scheme does not require this. This evolution-
ary theory of the Old Testament, with its assignment
of late dates for the different books, has, as we have
already intimated, evidently commended itself to
many critics, mainly because by assuming long periods
for the growth of religious ideas, it appears to render
direct revelations of truth less necessary to account
for the contents of the books of the Bible.
We freely admit that evolution, or the gradual
QUESTIONABLE METHODS, 117
development of higher or more perfect forms from
lower or p^erminal forms, is seen in nature. Gra«lual
development is one of God's methods of accomplishing
His purposes. The oak is evolved from the acorn.
Nor do we deny the development of doctrine in the
Scriptures and in the history of the Church. But
where it is assumed that evolution, which is a mode
or process, is a cause that accounts for all things, and
that it is the only mode by which force operates, this
assumption cannot be harmonized with the facts of
Divine Revelation, with Divine and human freedom
of action, or with the Incarnation and character of
Christ, who assuredly was not a product of evolution.
Any theory of evolution which denies or limits God's
freedom of action, or human freedom, must be wrong.
If the laws of nature which operate with such great
uniformity, are not inconsistent with humnn free-
dom of action, why should it be assumed that the
law of evolution is inconsistent with Divine freedom ?
The way in which evolution is commonly regarded
since the promulgation of Darwin's views, as if it was
the cause of all things, is well known. But the appli-
cation of evolution to the origin of the books of the
Bible, in the sense of being the cause, cannot be justi-
fied by attested facts and sound arguments.
There is good ground to say that most of the
questionable conclusions of modern criticism give
evidence, that they are the result of the previous
adoption of the evolutionary hypothesis of the Bible,
rather than the outcome of a scholarly and unpre-
judiced examination of the facts, relating to the books
118 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
or passages which are the subjects under considera-
tion.
With a large class of critics, every question that
arises in the critical study of the Bible has to be
settled in harmony with this theory. The facts have
to be adjusted to the hypothesis. On many critical
questions one can tell beforehand what their verdict
will be, without any knowledge of the arguments by
which it will be advocated. The decision will be
what the assumed hypothesis requires. With many
of the evolutionary critics every interpretation of
Scripture that implies a distinct supernatural revela-
tion of religious truth or future events, must be
ignored or explained away so as not to conflict with
their critical creed. Does not this fact throw doubt
on their conclusions ? This underlying dogma is
often assumed where it is not openly avowed ; and
even where it is repudiated by those who profess
faith in the supernatural in some sense. Men some-
times continue to profess faith in the supernatural,
after they have adopted schemes which virtually
supersede belief in the miraculous interposition of a
personal God in human affairs.
It is a pertinent remark of a modern writer that
" when a man adopts, even tentativelj^", an hypothesis,
he is likely to undergo a temptation to cease to be
impartial in his research. Once adopted, the T^ets
must adjust themselves to the theory, or suffer the
consequence." For example, if the evolutionist theory,
that there is no predictive reference to the historic
Christ in Old Testament prophecy, be adopted by any
QUESTIONABLE METHODS, 119
one, as a matter of course he must empty every
Messianic prophecy of its predictive meaning, and
every New Testament statement respecting the ful-
filment of prophecy must be explained away into a
mere " application," so as to harmonize with this
negative theory — however unscientific and unjustifi-
able such a procedure may be.
Coming to the study of the Scriptures with a pre-
conceived theory, as to the way in which they were
produced, makes the work of such critics largely con-
sist of learned and ingenious efforts to bring the
recorded facts and teaching of the sacred writings into
line with their fundamental critical canons, rather
than to determine what is the direct and indirect
testimony of the Bible respecting itself. It has been
well said : " All the labor bestowed upon every part
of the Hebrew literature falls to the ground, if the
method of enquiry is one which does not admit of
trustworthy results."
The critical methods of many of the higher critics
liave been fitly called " the canonization of conjecture."
It is scarcely possible to exaggerate the extent to
which the extreme conclusions of the advanced critics
rest on speculative conjecture. We do not object to
the use of hypotheses or " guesses at truth," as a
means of discovering what is true. Even erroneous
conjectures may be stepping-stones to better things.
What we are protesting against is the common prac-
tice of suggesting a conjectural solution of some
important critical problem, and then proceeding to
treat this supposition as if it were an attested fact, on
which other conclusions may be built.
120 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
All who are familiar with the writings of Cheyne,
Driver, Briggs, Robertson Smith, and Wellhausen,
their master, know that this is a common practice of
writers of this school. Without a vestige of historic
proof, on some slight pretext, a psalm or prophecy is
assigned to the latest possible date ; and then a sup-
posed reference to it in some other book of Scripture
is taken as evidence that this book is a still later pro-
duction. It is surprising on what very slight evidence
these critics accept every notion that favors their
theory ; but they do not fail to subject all opposing
facts and statements to unsparing condemnation.
Difficulties in Scripture, which afford any pretext for
rejecting the historic conception of the Bible, are un-
duly magnified, and reasonable explanations of such
difficulties peremptorily rejected. Such a partial
method would be called partisan, if manifested in
political discussion.
In the art of substituting mere assertions and con-
jectures for proof Canon Cheyne, in his Bampton
lectures on the Psalms, takes a foremost place, though
his friend Canon Driver is not far behind him. With
Dr. Cheyne the assigning of the time of the writing of
nearly all the Psalms to the period of the Maccabees
is a hobby, that must be rode over everything which
stands in its way. Nearly every song of triumph
must be fitted to some victory of Simon or Judas and
nothing else ; though there may be fifty historic
occasions that have equal, and even stronger claims to
be the time that called forth these Psalms. Of Psalm
ex., ascribed by our Lord to David, and held by such
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 121
Hebrew scholars as Delitzsch, Perowne and McLaren
to be Davidic and Messianic, Canon Cheyne dogma-
tically, says : " It sets before us Simon as a king of
righteousness, and as sitting at Jehovah's right hand
on Mount Zion ! " Such is his need of Maccabean
Psalms for his theory, that he says : " If no Psalms
probably Maccabean had been preserved, we should be
compelled to presume that they once had existed."
Of Psalm cxviii., he confidently says: " The historic
background is singularly definite," so he assigns it to
Maccabean times, about 165 B.C. Yet, others have
regarded the background so far from "singularly
definite," that eminent scholars have differed widely as
to its date. Ewald assigns it to the first year after
the return from the Captivity ; Hengstenberg to the
time of laying the foundation of the second temple ;
Delitzsch to the completion of the temple ; Stier and
Perowne to the Feast of Tabernacles after the comple-
tion of the second temple — all of them over 300 years
earlier than the date Cheyne assigns it with such
oracular positiveness. He rejects King David, the
Psalmist of Israel, when his theory requires it, and
invents a new David in harmony with his critical
theories. He says, " I feel bound to assume the exist-
ence of a David subsequently to the poet-king, to
account for the character of the book of Amos." He
has no difficulty with the expressed statement in
2 Samuel xxii. and 1st verse, that the 18th Psalm was
spoken by David at a certain time mentioned. He
knows better. He says it " was conjecturally ascribed
to the idealized David not long before the Exile."
122 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
And we are further informed that " the author of
Psalm xviii. thinks himself into the soul of David."
It will be seen that he draws on his imagination for
his facts. Questions of great importance in their
bearing on the authority and truth of the Bitle are
settled by such expressions as, " we can hardly err in
supposing ; " " we may yet suppose," " can there be
much doubt ; " " who else can be meant but Simon ? "
" their post-Exile origin needs no proof ;" " what more
natural than that Simon should follow the example of
David his prototype as described in the Chronicles, and
make fresh regulations for the liturgical services of
the sanctuary." The dates of Psalms and events fixed
by this kind of guess-work, are made standards of com-
parison by which the age of other Psalms is settled.
It would be easy to supply numerous examples of the
use of this questionable method of proof by this learned
leader of English higher critics.
Canon Cheyne is not singular in the use of this
questionable method of proof. Dr. Driver also deals
largely in such expressions as, "it seems probable,"
" it is not impossible," " it is quite possible," " it is very
possible." One of his critics has said : " It has been
contended that probability is the guide of life ; Dr.
Driver will contend that possibility is the stay of his
critical existence." Though some regard him as safe
and orthodox, it is truly said of him : " He believes
thoroughly in the methods of the modern school of
criticism, and accepts the most important of its
results." 1
^ liihliotheca Sacra, October, 1892.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 123
This is clearly shown by the readiness with which
he denies the historicity of Deuteronomy, and accepts
the late authorship of this book and of most of the
Psalms, on very slight evidence. In spite of his
moderate and hypothetical way of putting things, he
makes the facts bend to the evolutionary theory of
the Kuenen and Wellhausen school. In assigning
Deuteronomy mainly to an unknown author who
wrote it at a late date and ascribed it to Moses, Dr.
Driver strangely argues that the book does not claim
to be written by Moses, because it is written in the
third person. And he seems to think it a sufficient
justification of the supposed writer's falsification of
history, that he had a good purpose, and " gave articu-
late expression to the thoughts and feelings which it
was presdmed the person in question (Moses) would
have entertained ! "
The prophecy of Joel makes clear reference to
Mosaic laws found in the Pentateuch ; so as we might
expect, nearly all advanced critics of our day are in
favor of assigning to that book a very late date. Dr.
Driver naturally combats the date of the time of
Jehoash; but he passes over without notice the
arguments in favor of its being written in the time
of Uzziah, though this opinion, according to Meyrick
in the " Speaker's Commentary," is supported by
nineteen critics and commentators, including the
names of Rosenmuller, Eichhorn, De Wette, Knobel,
Hengstenberg, Davidson and other eminent scholars.
Dr. Driver must have been aware that this view was
strongly supported by these famous critics.
124 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Prof. Robertson Smith, in his advocacy of a late
date for this prophet, does not hesitate to appeal,
among other things, to what is said of the locusts in
Joel ii. 9 : " They shall run upon the wall, they
shall climb upon the houses, they shall enter in at
the windows like a thief," as showing, in his opinion,
a reference to the restoration of the city wall by
Nehemiah. Just as if there was no other wall but
that of the city. Evidently a great scholar may use
a very weak argument.
Dr. Richard Valpy French cites a striking illustra-
tion of this practice of drawing large conclusions
from slight premises. Prof. C. A. Briggs finds that it
is sufficient to read the law of Numbers vi. to see that
Samson w^as a very difierent kind of Nazarite from
that contemplated in the " Priests' Code." Dr. French
says: "What is his proof? He urges that Samson
uses the jawbone of an ass as a weapon of destruction,
in violation of the law of the Nazarite in the ' Priests'
Code,' which forbids the Nazarite from coming into
contact with a dead body. So then, the fact that
Samson used the first thing that came to his hand,
when suddenly called upon to defend his life, is the
best argument he can adduce to prove that Samson
not only disregarded Mosaic law, but was ignorant of
it."-
Canon Gore, in " Lux Mundi," in a sort of apology
for the writers who falsely ascribed their own pro-
ductions to Moses, maintains that the Mosaic germ
was developed by them, " the whole result being con-
8 "Lex Mo8aica,"p. 160.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 125
dantly attribiUed, probably unconsciously and cer-
tainly not from any intention to deceive, to the
original founder." Again he says : " What we are
asked to admit is, not conscious perversion, but un-
conmioiis idealizimj of history, the reading back into
past records of ritual development which was really
later." Well does Bishop Blomfield say : " The idea
of the ' Deuteronomist ' unconsciously ascribing to
Moses long discourses, which he had himself composed
out of his own head, is to an ordinary mind unthink-
able." Not only so. But this " unconscious ideal-
izing of history " implies the deliberate recording as
actual facts of events that, according to these critics,
never took place, although they are seriously set
down as the occasions of the deliverance of divine
laws and authoritative moral precepts.
Wellhausen, who has done more than anv other to
make the current theory popular, and who is the great
authority in that school of criticism, practices very
largely this method of building important conclusions
on very slender and fanciful foundations. Only a few
examples can be given. In commenting on Genesis xi.
1-9, "And the whole earth was of one language and
of one speech," etc., he affirms that this passage "does
not look back to tlie flood — the narrator knows
nothing of the flood." The fact that the narrator
does not here mention the flood gives no ground
whatever for this assertion. The patriarch Abraham
he regards as somewhat difficult to interpret. But he
says : " That is not to say that, in such a connection
as this, we may regard him as a historical person ; he
126 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
might with more likelihood be regarded as a free
creation of unconscious art." Reducing " the father
of the faithful " and the historic progenitor of nations
to " a free creation of unconscious art " is certainly a
bold example of the free and easy method of dealing
with Scripture. He declares the Tabernacle of the
Congregation an invention of the author of the
" Priests' Code," an imitation of Solomon's Temple ;
and then having rejected the account in the Penta-
teuch and the reference to it in Judges, assumes that
in Judges " there is no mention of the Tabernacle ;
. . . it has disappeared."
He declares that Jeremiah is unacquainted with the
Mosaic legislation, as it is contained in the " Priestly
Code." The proof he gives of this is the words in
chapter vii. 22 : "I said nought to your fathers, . . .
in the day when I brought them out of the land of
Egypt, concerning burnt offerings and sacjifices."
Passing over the special meaning which he gives these
words, it is enough to say that he himself supposes
Jeremiah to be acquainted with Deuteronomy, for he
alleges that " in the work of producing Deuteronomy
he had taken an active part." But that book ex-
pressly enjoins burnt offerings and sacrifices (xii. 6).
If Jeremiah's knowing Deuteronomy was not incon-
sistent with the words quoted in proof of his ignorance
of sacrifices, how would his knowing Leviticus be
inconsistent with such knowledge ? As a proof of
the late date of Genesis, Wellhausen says : " In Genesis
xxvii. 40 allusion is made to the constantly repeated
subjugations of Edom by Judah, alternating with
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 127
successful revolts on the part of the former."'^ Where
would it be supposed he got this information ? He
infers it from the words in the blessing of Jacob,
" let thy mother's sons bow down to thee." He can-
not admit that there is anything prophetic in the
patriarch's words, and so he assumes that this must
have been written after these historic events, and
ascribed to Jacob as a prophetic blessing by the
writer. This is certainly not very "scientific."'^
A striking instance of this great critic's unfairness
is mentioned by both Dr. Terry, of Evanston, and Dr.
A. Stewart, of Aberdeen. Wellhausen had appealed
to the statement in Chronicles, that Manasseh was
carried captive to Babylon by the King of Assyria, as
a proof of the falsity of the writer of Chronicles.
But the cuneiform inscription of Esar-haddon, the
king, explicitly states that Manasseh was his prisoner.
Nevertheless, Wellhausen refuses to accept the correc-
tion which he cannot refute, and flippantly says : " In
truth Manasseh's temporary deposition is entirely on
the same plane with Nebuchadnezzar's temporary
grass-eating."* Dr. Terry says : " Pitiable is Well-
hausen's attempt to disparage the bearing of the in-
scription on the question here at issue."
External evidence is not in favor with these critical
leaders. Both Kuenen and Wellhausen give a parti-
cular account of the way in which the priestly school
of Ezekiel produced the ' Priests' Code," which they
suppose to have been completed by Ezra, as if they
"'* Page 464.
4i< Prolpgomena," p. 207.
128 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
were writing a veritable history of facts ; though
there is neither external nor internal evidence to sup-
port the conjectures, which they narrate as if they
had witnessed what they describe. In fact, the
ritualism of Ezekiel is (juite different from the
" Priests' Code," of which he is said to be the father
or originator.
Professor Budde maintains that the early religious
ideas of Israel were borrowed from the Kenites, and
afterwards developed into the monotheistic religion,
which has had so much influence in the world. But
little or nothing is known of the history or religion of
the Kenites. There is no historic accounts on which to
base such a theory. That this fact is not regarded as
standing in the way of accepting his notion is very
significant. Why is there such readiness to ascribe
the historic and religious ideas of the Israelites to
heathen peoples, and to deny that other nations re-
ceived any religious ideas from them ? It looks like
a disposition to overthrow the claim of Israel, to have
received through their prophets supernatural revela-
tions of divine truth not given to others.
It will be admitted that Dr. Driver expresses the
creed of his school, which has now become " tradi-
tional," when he says : " The age and authorship of
the books of the Old Testament can be determined
(so far as this is possible) only upon the basis of the
internal evidence supplied by the books themselves,
by methods such as those followed in the present
volume; no external evidence worthy of credit exists."^
' Page xxxi.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS.
129
This sweeping statement suggests two questions,
viz: (1) Is it true that there is no historic evi-
dence worth considering ? (2) Are the methods of
the higher critics, in dealing with the internal evi-
dence of the contents of the books of the Bible, fair
and scientific ?
It is not true that there is no historic evidence.
Although the term "historic criticism" is used to
designate current rationalist theories about the Old
Testament, there is good reason to say that " unhis-
toric criticism " would be a more suitable designation.
The most revolutionary departures from the biblical
conception of the Scriptures have no historic support
whatever. Have we not stronger evidence of the
Mosaic origin of the Hebrew laws contained in the
Pentateuch, than of the genuineness of the works of
Homer and Heroditus, or even of Thucydides ? Are
there any ancient writings in the world, to the contents
of which such frequent and distinct reference is made
in later writings ? Is the direct and indirect testi-
mony of Bible history and prophecy to be set aside at
will ? Does the universal belief of the Hebrew peo-
ple, " the only people who for many centuries knew
anything about the matter at all," offer no evidence
worthy of credit ? Is the testimony of Josephus and
other learned Jewish writers to be ruled out of court,
because it is not in favor of the plaintiffs ? Are the
explicit references in Ezra and Nehemiah to the
Mosaic laws misleading fictions, that have no historic
weight ? Does the repeatedly expressed beliefs of our
Lord and His Apostles, unquestioned by the whole
9
130 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Christian Church till recent times, possess no historic
value ? In the book of Ecclesiasticus, written nearly
200 years B.C., there is a clear ascription of the 40th
chapter of Isaiah to Isaiah the prophet. But this
external evidence counts for nothing with the critics.
Would not they deem it evidence worth something,
if this writer had intimated that the latter part of
this book was written by a prophet of the Exile ?
Well does ex-President Bartlett say : " The great
weight of the historic traditions of a nation with an
unbroken history of an unparalleled character, and the
collateral tests, now rapidly accumulating from anti-
quarian researches, are too much overlooked and some-
times summarily set aside." Is it uncharitable to think,
that Driver and his school disparage external evidence,
not because there is none, but because all that exists
is against them ? And yet, so competent a judge as
Prof. Fritz Hommel says : " External evidence must
he the banner under which all students of Old Testa-
ment literature are to range themselves in future.''
Certainly, the so-called " scientific " subjective study
of the internal evidence has given us some extravagant
and untenable theories, that should effectually dis-
credit that kind of critical evidence.
As we have seen, the higher critics claim that they
base their conclusions on the internal evidence, sup-
plied by a careful study of the contents of the books
of the Bible. Yet it seems to many competent judges,
that a large part of the higher criticism consists of
critical efforts to eliminate or explain away internal
evidence, in the form of references to events or an
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 131
alleged condition of things, which staiidH in the way
of their main aasumptions. A good illustration of
how not to accept internal evidence, when it does not
agree with a theory, is shown in Cheyne's treatment
of the 137th Psalm. This Psalm describes the feel-
ings of the Israelites in Babylon. By any one not
having a theory to maintain, it would be assigned to
the time of the Exile. But this does not suit Dr.
(.'hoyne. So drawing on his imagination, he assigns
it to the time of Simon the Maccabee ; and says that
"just as the author of Psalm xviii. thinks himself into
the soul of David, so a later temple-singer identities
liimself by sympathy with his exiled predecessors in
Babylon ! " This is building hypothesis on hypothesis.
The 23rd Psalm is another striking example. No
circumstances could be a more suitable occasion for
expressing the sentiments of this beautiful Psalm than
those of King David fleeing from Absalom, when he
and his followers were met at Mahanaim, and their
wants supplied by Barzillai the Gileadite. David hav-
ing been a shepherd would naturally suggest the figure
of the Lord being his shepherd. He was indeed a
wandering sheep. He had been walking in the shadow
of danger and death. His life had been given back
to him from imminent peril. In the presence of his
enemies a table had been richly spread for him. The
past goodness of God might well inspire the hope of
restoration to Jerusalem, where he would again dwell
in the house of the Lord. These are the very thoughts
expressed in the Psalm. Well may an American
critic ask : " Is it not violent to take this Psalm from
132 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
such a setting and such an author on the basis of
mere conjecture, and without even the meagre com-
pensation of finding for it elsewhere a local habitation
and a name ? " But the religious sentiments it con-
tains, according to the critics, are too high for David ;
and 80 it must be assigned to some late unknown
author, whose piety was equal to its production.
The treatment of the book of Deuteronomy is very
much in point. The internal evidence of its Mosaic
origin is clear and strong. There are references to
life in the wilderness, to the anticipated settlement
in Canaan, to the recent deliverance from Egypt, to
what they were to do and not to do after they were
settled in Canaan, and to the circumstances and occa-
sions when certain laws were given. Even Kuenen
says : " On the face of the whole legislation, of course,
we read that the theatre is the desert ; Israel is en-
camped there ; the settlement in Canaan is in the
future."" With any fair treatment these facts would
be tak -^ as strong proof of the date and authorship
of these writings. But on slight objections, which
have been fairly answered, all this internal evidence
has been thrown aside, evidently, because if it were
accepted it would be an unanswerable proof of the
early " Ethical Monotheism," which the critical dogmas
of these critics compel them to regard as an evolution
of much later times.
But the most objectionable of all these unjustifiable
methods is the common practice of Wellhausen and
his English and American followers, of rejecting texts
• " Hexateuch," p.[25.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 133
and discrediting at will, books which contradict their
critical scheme, on the ground that they are interpo-
lations, or fabrications of designing authors or redac-
tors. The way in which this is done can neither be
justified nor excused. These critics professedly come
to the Bible to examine the evidence it presents
respecting the time and manner in which its differ-
ent books were produced. But it is only to the Old
Testament, after they have arbitrarily altered and
expurgated it to suit themselves, that they make their
appeal. If space permitted, it would be easy to give
illustrations of this indefensible practice. Professor
Robertson, of Glasgow, speaking of this practice, says :
" The passages which disturb a pet theory are declared
to disturb the connection. We have, in fact, no con-
temporary reliable documents till the critic has adjust-
ed them ; and the theory ultimately is appealed to in
confirmation of itself," '^ Dr. R. P. French utters
a similar indignant complaint. He says : " We
may not take the documents as we find them, but in
the form which the modern critical instinct regards
as their genuine or proper form ; that is to say, the
form that best suits their hypothesis — all 'VQrds^
phrases and sections which contradict it having been
carefully altered or eliminated."*^
Dr. C. H. H. Wright, in his " Introduction to the
Old Testament," remarks, " It is very convenient for
scholars who defend the Graf-Wellhausen hypothesis
to seek to get rid of all, or many, of the references
' Page 160.
»♦« Lex Mosaica," p. 126.
134 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
found in the Prophets and other Scriptures to the
incidents of early days, as later interpolations. There
has been, indeed, on the part of these critics, too
great a disposition to 'cook' the documents examined
and to assume on mere hypothesis that words, sen-
tences and paragraphs opposed to certain theories
are ^merely the insertions of later editors.'"^ Even
Professor Klosterman sharply rebukes the arbitrary
character of this method, of " assuming errors and a
disfiguration of the text, whenever without this they
would get into a corner with their criticism of sources
or their exes:esis." ^^
Those who are not familiar with the writings of
this school of critics may find it difficult to believe
how generally and unjustifiably this mode of getting
inconvenient passages out of the way is practised. I
regret that my limits as to space will not permit me
to give more than a few examples, though the supply
is abundant. As the Pentateuch is the great battle-
field, the efforts of these critics are, as we have seen,
largely directed to criticisms of the references to
Mosaic laws or events which appear in the later
books, before the time to which the production of the
chief parts of the Pentateuch have been assigned by
them. Evidence of this kind, which cannot be ex-
plained away, must be eliminated on some pretext.
In common with Wellhausen, though with less of
positive and offensive dogmatism, Dr. Driver, in his
" Introduction," assumes and insinuates so much that
9 Page 99.
10 «« The Pentateuch," p. 61.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 135
is adapted to destroy confidence in the truth and reli-
ability of the historic books of the Old Testament,
that it is easy for those who accept his conception of
these books to go a step further, and reject any state-
ments that are not in harmony with their critical
creed. For example, an incident in the book of
Judges, he says, " is pretty clearly a gloss, and so no
real indication of the period to which the incident
was assigned by the original narrator."" A sentence
quoted from Judges, he says " from its character
must certainly be pre-Exilic, and stamps the nar-
ratives of which it forms a part as pre-Exilic like-
wise." As if it were an important matter to find a
sign thai iny portion of this book was written before
the captivity. Re freely charges the writer of this
book with exaggerating the facts. He has no hesi-
tation in denying the historicity of a passage, without
taking the trouble to give the grounds of his denial.
He says: "Korah is united with Dathan and Abiram,
not in reality, but only in the narrative." Again:
" It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the re-
presentation of P. (" Priests' Code ") includes elements
not in the ordinary sense of the terms historical." ^^
As with his German masters, he finds an imaginary
" redactor " a useful scapegoat in all emergencies. He
speaks as if he had a personal acquaintance with a
" redactor imbued with the spirit of Deuteronomy.
His additions exhibit a phraseology and coloring
different from that of the rest of the book."
What Driver suggests and insinuates, Wellhausen,
"Page 160. 12 Page 120.
136 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Cheyne and others confidently assert. Wellhausen
tells us that " In Judges, Samuel, and Kings even,
we are not presented with tradition purely in its
original conditions, already it is overgrown witli
later accretions. . . . The whole area of tradition
has finally been uniformly covered with an alluvial
deposit." ^'
Robertson Smith, says : " The Chronicler assumes
that this organization of the singers dated from
David; but in reality it was quite modern."^* Presi-
dent Harper speaks of the imaginary " redactor " of
Genesis in very depreciatory terms in Hebraica. He
says : " His spirit is far from being a critical one. He
did not hesitate to use his material in any way that
would best subserve his aim. He inserted and omit-
ted, changed and arranged. He handled his sources
as freely as if he had been the author."
Though the unity, time, and genuineness of Hosea,
Amos and Micah are beyond disproof, yet nearly
every verse or passage in these prophets that makes
any reference to the laws of Moses contained in the
Pentateuch are questioned as later interpolations, or
their natural meaning denied. This is done where
there is no reason to think that the text is corrupt.
In a note Wellhausen says of Hosea : " He e iven speaks
with favor of David and the Kingdom of Judah ; but
I consider all such references in Hosea (as well as
in Amos) to be interpolations. In i. 7. there is a refer-
ence to the deliverance of Jerusalem under Heze-
13 ♦• Prolegomena," p. 228,
" *« Old Testament, in the Jewish Church," p. 204.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 137
kiah."« Hosea wrote before the time of Hezekiah ;
but in order to discredit the references which
Hosea makes to the Pentateuch this gratuitous asser-
tion is made. Dr. Cheyne, in a sermon on Elijah,
says : " The story-tellers of Israel — at least those
whose works have been preserved in the sacred canon
— arranged and ornamented the wild growths of
popular tradition in such a way as to promote sound
morality and religion. . . . This is why [their
works] are so true to nature, that persons who are
devoid of a sense for literature often suppose them to
be true to fact. True to fact ! Who goes to the artist
for hard dry facts ? " This remarkable estimate of
the Hebrew Scriptures is given in a volume entitled,
" The Hallowing of Criticism," as if this kind of
criticism promoted faith and piety.
The books of Chronicles are historic compilations
of admittedly late date. They are evidently intended
to supplement the books of Kings, and to place the
history in what the writer regards as a clearer rela-
tion to the over-ruling providence of God. Hence,
greater prominence is given to the character of the
King's, and to their ob«3rvance or neglect of the laws
and religion of Israel, than in the books of Kings.
The spirit of the writer is eminently devout and
reverent. Very naturally there is frequent reference
to the laws and ritual in the Pentateuch. If the
truth of these records is admitted, the critical theory
of the late development of the religion of Israel would
be upset. So the whole artillery of the higher critics
15 Page 417.
138 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
is brought into play, to discredit and disparage the
Chronicles as a partial and fraudulent work, written
for the purpose of making it appear that laws and
ordinances of late origin were of Mosaic times and
authority. The most reckless and unscrupulous
charges are made against the author of these books.
The fact that Ezra is the reputed author does not
cause either fairness or moderation in the criticism of
these historical books by Wellhausen.
It is doubtful if ever any historian, secular or
sacred, was as fraudulent and unscrupulous as the
writer of the Chronicles is represented to have been.
It has been pertinently said : " When he gives the
same material as is found in the books of Kings, he is
held in disrespect on the ground that he has copied
without even verbal alteration or addition. When he
adds anything in the Chronicles which is not found in
the Kings, he is blamed and treated as a fabricator." I
must refer my readers to the " Pulpit Commentary,"
to Professor Terry's essay in *' Moses and his Recent
Critics," and Dr. A. Stewart's essay in " Lex Mosaica,"
for replies to these assaults on the Chronicles.
Dr. Stewart classes under different heads character-
izations of Wellhausen's treatment of Chronicles, as
follows: (1) Expressions indicating disrespect towards
the chronicler and his work ; (2) Expressions indi-
cating a charge of duplicity or dishonesty ; (8) Con-
tradictions and self-refutations ; (4) Contempt for
commentators who explain or harmonize the contra-
dictions charged ; (5) Sarcastic reflections on piety —
especially piety and faith in the supernatural. I am
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 139
bound to say that this indictment is unanswerably
sustained, by statements in Wellhausen's "Prologomena
of the History of Israel." In that work he freely
uses such expressions as these ; " We have before us a
deliberate, and in its motives a very transparent
mutilation of the original narrative as preserved in
the Book of Samuel." "The author of Chronicles
was able to introduce them (Levites) only by distort-
ing and mutilating his original, and landing himself
in contradiction after all." " It is certain that quite
as many (elements from tradition) have been simply
invented." " It is indeed possible that occasionally a
grain of good corn may occur among the chaff." It
is hard to realize that it is the Hebrew Scriptures of
which the chief German oracle is speaking so flip-
pantly and bitterly. I need scarcely say, that it has
been successfully shown by the authors named, that
these partisan allegations cannot be justified ; but we
have not space to give these replies here.
When words, that have been declared to be the
distinguishing marks of two different writers, occur
where it is inconsistent with the scheme of the higher
critics that they should appear, the difficulty is met
by ascribing their insertion to some later writer or
redactor. Nothing is more significant in the practice
of the higher critics than the use they make of
imaginary "redactors," or editors. Wherever any-
thing occurs in the Hebrew documents that is not in
harmony with their fundamental hypothesis, its
authenticity must be denied. It is therefore laid upon
the " redactor," who, it is assumed, was always on
140 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
hand at whatever time and place, are thought neces-
sary to account for the insertion of anything which
the critics find it desirable to eliminate or explain
away.
The process adopted in making the " Polychrome
Bible" is thus wittily described by Andrew Lang:
" The method is simple and Teutonic. You have a
theory, you accept the evidence of the sacred writers
as far as it suits your theory, and when it does not
suit, you say that the inconvenient passage is an
interpolation. It must be, for if not what becomes of
your theory ? So you print the inconvenient passage
in green, I suppose, or what not, and then the people
know all about it."
The part which these critics allege was played by the
" redactor " suggests some rather puzzling questions
Why is there just the number of redactors which the
emergencies of each critic requires ? " Cornill (1891)
specifies not less than eighteen different writers and
editors. Wellhausen wants twenty or more. Dill-
man, the strongest scholar of them all, sturdily rejects
seven or eight of these imaginary personages. "What
mortal could surely discriminate the parts of twenty,
twelve, or even six writers in one composition, fairly
well combined ? " (Bartlett.) Why is there no refer-
ence in the Hebrew Scriptures to the names or work
of men who did so much ? By what authority were
such men allowed to corrupt the sacred writings of
the Hebrews in the manner alleged ? By what right
do the higher critics claim the liberty of rejecting
whatever is against their critical creed, while no
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 141
similar liberty is conceded to their opponents ? It is
very significant that no passages that can be construed
to favor the view of the disintegrating critics are
deemed an interpolation ; and that every charge of
interpolation made against the supposed " redactor "
is made to get rid of facts that are against the
assumptions of the advanced critical theorizers.
The Rev. W. E. Barton, in a review of Canon
Driver's Introduction, in the Bibliotheca Sacra of
October, 1892, speaking of the higher critics says:
"The method of the doctor in Mrs. Stowe's story,
' The Minister's Housekeeper,' is not unknown to
tliem. ' He was great on texts the doctor was.
When he had a p'int to prove he'd just go thro' the
Bible and drive all the texts ahead o' him, like a
flock o' sheep; and then, if there was a text that
seemed agin him, why, he'd come out with his Greek
and Hebrew, and kind o' chase 'round a spell, jest as
ye see a fellar chase a contrary bell-wether, and make
him jump the fence arter the rest. I tell ye there
wern't no text in the Bible that could stand agin the
Doctor when his blood was up.' "
Criticism, in the sense of thorough Biblical study,
is all right and proper ; it is in the practice of some of
the high priests of the new criticism that the unjusti-
fiable methods are seen. There are two conclusions
which the examination of such critical methods as
these is adapted to impress on the minds of all im-
partial students : (1) That it cannot be a sound and
true theory of the Bible which requires such modes
of proof. (2) That the teachers, who use these
142 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
questionable methods of advocating their views, can-
not be safe guides for Christian people, who desire to
retain faith in the truth and divine authority of the
Holy Scriptures, and the power as well as the form
of godliness.
In view of such facts as those we have cited, little
weight is due to Dr. Driver's dogmatic assertion —
" The main conclusions of critics with reference to the
authorship of the books of the Old Testament rest
upon reasonings, the cogency of which cannot be
denied, without denying the ordinary principles by
which history is judged and evidence estimated."
Most readers will agree with Bishop Blomlield, who
says, " On the contrary, it is because these conclusions
flagrantly contradict those principles that they are
called in question." ^'^
No reputation for scholarship, piety and ability
can confer the right to use such methods of maintain-
ing a cause, as those we have pointed out in the pre-
ceding pages.
In setting forth these questionable methods I have
given facts, not merely my opinion. Let no one be
misled by the plea, that the objections to these current
critical methods of dealing with the Old Testament
are the product of the prejudices of " traditionalists "
who are incapable of appreciating the arguments of
" scholars." Similar views of these methods are held
and vindicated by distinguished scholars, who have
spent their lives in the study of Hebrew and other
i«"The Old Testament and the New Criticism," page 115.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 143
Oriental languages and literatures. A few illustra-
tions will suffice.
Prof. Matthew Leitch, of Belfast, in an article in
the TreaHwry Magazine, gives some suggestive rules,
based on these critical methods, the practical adop-
tion of which secures unity in the main among the
higher critics. One of these rules is as follows : " If
a passage contain a prophecy, assign it to a writer
who lived after the event prophesied ; if a miracle,
bring it down to a date so long after the event, that
no credibility can be attached to the narrative." It
is probable this rule would not be acknowledged by
the critics, but it is faithfully observed and practised
in their work.
Prof. James Robertson, speaking of these processes,
says : " The literary task of critical writers, therefore,
is not so much to discover and account for facts of a
history long past, as to account for the accounts
which later writers give of them. The history which
Wellhausen constructs is, in fact, a history of the
tradition ; and in many cases it seems a laborious
endeavor to show how something very definite grew
out of nothing very appreciable. The further one fol-
lows the processes, the more apparent it becomes that
the endeavor is not so much to find out by fair inter-
pretation what the writer says, as to discover his
(supposed) motive for saying it, or what he wishes to
conceal. . . . Wellhausen and his school first find an
idea, and then seek by main force to read it into the
unwilling documents. In this way a history is no
144 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
doubt constructed ; but the supporting beams are
subjective prepossessions, and the materials are only
got by discrediting the sources from which they are
drawn." ^^
Prof. Howard Osgood, a distinguished member of
the Old Testament Revision Committee, says : " So
far from being strictly historical, this method is the
canonization of conjecture." ^^
Professor Sayce, of Oxford, the learned Orientalist
and archaeologist, characterizes the methods of these
higher critics as follows : " Baseless assumptions have
been placed on a level with ascertained facts, hasty
conclusions have been put forward as principles of
science, and we have been called upon to accept the
prepossessions and fancies of the individual critic as
the revelation of a new gospel. If the archaeologist
ventured to suggest that the facts he had discovered
did not support the views of the critic, he was told he
was no philologist. The opinion of a modern German
theologian was worth more, at all events in the eyes
of his * school,' than the most positive testimony of
the monuments of antiquity. . . . There are popes
in the * higher criticism ' as well as in theology."^"
Prof. Herman Strack, of Berlin, says : " The writ-
ings of the Old Testament are violently treated, both
from a critical and exegetical point of view, in order
to serve the new theory of Hebrew history,
"20
" " p]arly Religion of Israel," p. 467.
18 Bibliotheca Sacra, July, 1893, p. 464.
19 •« The Higher Criticism and the Monuments," p. 5.
20 " Schaff-Herzog Encyclopaedia," p. 1794.
QUESTIONABLE METHODS. 146
Prof. W. H. Green, of Princeton, who was chairman
of the American Revision Committee of the Old
Testament, says : " If new meanings may be imposed
upon paragraphs or sentences incompatible with
their present context ; if variance may be created by
expunging explanatory or harmonizing clauses; if
discrepancy may be inferred from a silence which is
itself produced by first removing the very statements
that are desiderated from the connection ; if what are
narrated as distinct events may be converted into irre-
concilable accounts of the same transaction, the most
closely connected composition can be rent into discord-
ant fragments. Such methods are subversive of all
just interpretation.'"^^
Professor Schodde, of Columbus University, Ohio,
in an article in the Treasury Magazine^ says : " The
arrogant claim that the advanced or radical biblical
criticism of the day is 'scientific' is entirely without
ground or basis ; on the contrary, in more than one
particular, it grossly violates the cardinal principle of
scientific research. For instance, to mention no other
point, the literary canon that the Old Testament
books or parts of books are the results of the develop-
ments which their contents describe, and in no way
the sources and causes of such a development, is a
gratuitous assumption and admits of no plausible
demonstration, being also a direct contradiction of
what is observed in other literatures." These remarks
do not refer merely to extreme Rationalists. They
apply to the disciples as well as to the masters. Yet
10 21 « Moses and his Recent Critics," p. 105.
146 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
some college professors who indignantly deny being
rationalist or heterodox, accept the critics who prac-
tise these methods as their leaders and guides in the
study of the Old Testament.
There is no way of evading the significance and
force of such testimonies, based upon incontrovertible
facts, except by ignoring relevant facts, and denying
that there is any value or weight in the critical judg-
ment of any one, no matter how able, honest, and
learned he may be, who does not accept the methods
and theories of the evolutionary critics.
CHAPTER VIII.
CONTRADICTORY DIFFERENCES OF
PROMINENT HIGHER CRITICS.
The Contradictory DiflFerences not Insignificant — Examples of
Wide Differences as to Dates — Differences Relate to the
Same Kind of Questions which Constitute the Main Ele-
ments of Higher Criticism — Reasons for Distrust.
THE contradictory opinions of prominent hig;her
critics who are learned in all the critical wisdom
of Germany, and profess to use the most scientific
methods of study, have a more direct bearing on the
value and truth of the theories and inferences of
this school of criticism than is generally recognized.
These differences are not the insignificant things that
certain critics would have us believe. A few ex-
amples, illustrating these contradictory differences of
critical judgment, will show that this is the case.
Without taking into consideration the objections of
eminent Hebrew scholars, who reject the evolutionary
hypothesis, the differences among the " higher critics "
themselves are significent and important. They show
that the common idea that there 's a definite result
of modern criticism, which all scholars accept, is not
justified by the facts.
Kuenen denies that the code of Deuteronomy takes
147
148 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
cognizance of any preceding one, though Wellhausen
and most of his followers hold the contrary opinion.
Dillmann and Noldeke assign the " Priests' Code " to
800 B.C., while most of the advanced critics assign it
to post-Exilic times. .Dr. Klosterman, the veteran
professor of Old Testament Exegesis in the Univer-
sity of Keil, whom no one can accuse of undue con-
servatism, in his treatise on " The Pentateuch," says,
that a distinguished historian said to him : " If Well-
hausen is right, I renounce all respect for the entire
fraternity of Old Testament scholars ; for what they
regarded as established truth and declared to be such,
to us outsiders proved to be the opposite of the truth
on the first serious attack."
Professors Cheyne and Driver are generally re-
garded as leaders in the English school of analytic
critics. Yet Cheyne wrote several articles in the
Expositor, reviewing Driver's " Introduction," in
which he charged his fellow-professor with failing to
carry out his principles to their logical results, in
order to conciliate conservative theologians.
A number of prominent scholars place the date of
Joel's prophecy in the time of Uzziah. Orelli, follow-
ing Credner, places it in the time of Jehoash. Winer,
Ewald, Hitzig, Kleinert, Hofmann, Delitzsch, Keil,
Wiinsch, Steiner and Kirkpatrick, all place it at or
near the same date. Bleek and Hengstenberg, place
it a little later. But Hilgenfield, Vatke, Seinecke,
Duhm, as well as Wellhausen and his English fol-
lowers, in whose critical creed late dates for the
books of the Bible is a prime article, contend for a
DIFFERENCES OF HIGHER CRITICS. 149
late post'Exilic origin.* Graf divided the"Grund-
schrift," or foundation document, into two parts. He
maintained that the narrative part belonged to the
ancient pre-Jehovistic writing, and that the legisla-
tive portion was as late as the Exile. But Kuenen
maintained, with greater reason, that " the two are
dominated by essentially the same conception, and
resemble each other so closely that they cannot pos-
sibly be severed by a period of three or four centu-
ries." Graf finally accepted the view of Kuenenj
and gave up what he had previously regarded as a
foundation principle.
At one time, the hypothesis that Deuteronomy was
the latest part of the Pentateuch was dominant. This
view was upheld by such eminent critics as Tuch,
Bleek, Knobel and others. Now the popular theory
of the hour is, that Deuteronomy was written nearly
200 years before the " Priests' Code," which the ad-
vanced critics declare to be post- Exilic. But Schrader
assigns the "Priests' Code" to the time of David; and
Dillmann strongly combats the late date contended
for by Kuenen, Wellhausen and their disciples. The
process of conjectural disintegration has been carried
to such an extent that one can hardly find two
" higher " critics who agree as to what parts of " the
Book of the Prophet Isaiah " were written by " Isaiah
of Jerusalem."
Canon Driver himself says : " On the relative date
of E and J the opinions of critics differ. Dillmann,
Kittel and Riehm assign the priority to E, placing him
1 See Orelli's "Minor Prophets."
150 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
900-850 B.C. and J 750, (Dillmann) 830-800 (Kittel),
or 750 (Riehm). Wellhausen, Kuenen and Stade, on
the other hand, assign the priority to J, placing him
850-800 B.C., and E 750.'"- Even one so strongly in
sympathy with the theories of the higher criticism
as Prof. A. B. Bruce, says : " Not to mention endless
diversity of view on special points, there are broad
contrasts between different schools, even with reference
to the leading critical problems."^
It is significant that nothing in the language or
style offers any hindrance to the critics changing the
dates of books a few hundred j^ears from what was
formerly held, such as placing the date of the " Priests'
Code " later than the book of Deuteronomy, which
was formerly held to be much the later of the two.
Prof. A. B. Davidson, of Edinburgh, is an eminent
and liberal biblical scholar. Yet, in a review of Pro-
fessor Duhm's Isaiah, he says : " The grounds on which
passages are denied to be Isaiah's, and ascribed to
another hand, or relegated to a later age, will have to
be examined in each particular case. While in some
cases these grounds are to be found in the methods
and idiosyncrasies of this particular commentator, in
most cases they will be found in the critical and his-
torical axioms with which the author has approached
his task."*
Even Kuenen and Wellhausen do not always agree.
Speaking of Deuteronomy, Kuenen says : " The
objections to the unity of authorship which have been
2" Introduction," p. 116. SM^/^poioggtics," p. 171.
* Critical Review, Jan. 1893.
DIFFERENCES OF HIGHER CRITICS. 151
urged by Wellhausen and Valeton are not convincing."
About the prophecy of Zeehariah there are three
theories and three distinct <rroups of critics. By one
group chapters ix.-xiv. are assigned to a pre-Exilic
date ; by another set of authors these chapters are
assigned a later date than the earlier ones ; by another
group of scholars the unity of the book is strongly
maintained. Each of these theories is advocated by
a number of distinguished scholars. The view of
Bishop Newton that chapters ix.-xi. were written
before the fall of the kingdom of Israel, and chapters
xii.-xiv. in the time of Jeremiah, has also been widely
held. 5
Prof. Howard Osgood says : " The contradictions
between Driver and Cornill on the present initial
point of this criticism cover more than one-third of
the book. Tneir contradictions on Isaiah are equally
great. These contradictions refer to the grounds for,
as well as to the assignments of parts to authors and
dates. And when we pass on and compare these
differences with those of Wellhausen, Kuenen,
Dillmann, Cheyne, Duhm, etc., we obtain a maze of
contradictory statements, by equally learned men,
that is bewildering." It has been well said by the
same writer: "The fact that one critic finds an
analysis self-evident does not seem to render it impos-
sible for the next one to hesitate even to pronounce
it composite, much less to assert that its analysis is
beyond dispute."
Even among those who accept the theory of several
''See Orelli's " Minor Prophets."
152 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
foundation documents, Professor Strack says : " This
view is held in forms differing very considerably ; the
differences concerning the order of succession and age
of the documents, rather than their classification,"
We need not remind our readers that " the order of
succession and age of the documents " are main ques-
tions in these modern critical speculations.
The following remarks of such a liberal critic as
Dr. A. B. Davidson, in a review of Lohr's book on the
" Lamentations," are very suggestive. He says : " The
diversity of opinion among modern scholars regarding
the authorship of the various chapters is extraordin-
ary, and nothing shews better the helplessness of
criticism when it has to rely on internal evidence
alone. Of chapter iii., Steinthal remarks that ' it
forms the moral climax of the whole,' while of the
same chapter, Noldeke says : ' It has least value, and
must in any case be assigned to a distinct poet.'
' That the writer of chapter ii., iv.,' says Thenius.
' cannot have written chapters i., iii. and v., it needs
only a very moderate share of aesthetic feeling to per-
ceive ; ' while Budde says : ' I see no ground for
denying that the author of chapters ii., iv., wrote
chapter i.' Stade and Budde agree that the author
of chapters i., ii., iv., cannot have written chapter
iii., but neither sees any ground for depriving him of
the authorship of chapter v., while Lohr attributes
chapters ii., iii., iv., to one author, but considers it
impossible that he can have written chapters i., v.,
the former chapter being wanting in clearness and
the latter in contents. . . . Perhaps Reuss is not far
DIFFERENCES OF HIGHER CRITICS. 153
wrong, when he linds in the attempts of scholars to
distribute the five chapters among different writers
nothing but *a prodigal waste of ingenuity.'"^
There are a great many cases to which Reuss's
phrase, a " prodigal waste of ingenuity," will apply.
With some of the German critics this practice of dis-
section and disintegration, based on internal evidence
alone, has been carried to an irrational extreme. In-
ternal evidence of style and thought may be studied
with advantage ; but in many cases it yields no sure
light. The authors of the "Polychrome Bible," in
which the conjectured writers of the original docu-
ments are indicated by different colors, assure us that
this Bible will " show at a glance whether the received
text is unquestionably correct, whether the passage is
original or a subsequent addition." " And this,' ' as Prof.
J. D. Davis says, " in the face of the fact that Haupt,
Siegfried, Wellhausen and Cheyne differ greatly in
their conclusions from critics of equal prominence."
But such a fact does not prevent dogmatic positive-
ness. It was certainly a shrewd policy for the
"redactors" of the "Polychrome" to assign each
book to one author. There is a strong probability
that no two critics would have agreed as to the docu-
mentary "sources" of any book. Those who have
seen the new production, or even Bissell's reprint in
English of Kautzsch and Socin's " Genesis in Colors,"
are likely to be of the opinion, that the " Polychrome
Bible " will do more to show the absurdity than the
scientific certainty of the speculations about imaginary
authors of Old Testament books.
^Critical Review^ Jan. 1894.
154 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
When these contradictory conclusions of higher
critics are cited, as a reason for distrusting the critical
methods that produce such conflicting results, the
common reply is that the differences are about minor
points ; but that there is a general consensus of
opinion among scholars on the main conclusions of
the analytic critics. Professor Herman Strack, who
in Germany is counted conservative, says : " The
differences of opinion among the critics, upon which
Keil lays stress, are after all not so great in funda-
mentals ; all agreeing (Wellhausen, Delitzch, etc.,) upon
the necessity of distinguishing the different sources
and agreeing, to a greater or less extent, in the
classification of the sections."
The reason of this unity among " higher " critics,
on the main points, is obvious enough. All who have
adopted as true the idea that the Scriptures are a
product of evolution, and who consequently feel
bound to minify or ignore supernatural divine inter-
position in the origin of the Scriptures, will naturally
be united in opposition to any conception of the Bible
which contradicts their fundamental assumption ;
though they may differ as to the mode by which
they explain away whatever is not in harmony with
their scheme. A number of persons might unite in
the pulling down of a building, and yet differ widely
as to what should be put in its place.
But these differences of higher critics derive
GREAT significance FROM THE FACT THAT THEY
relate TO THE SAME KIND OF QUESTIONS, AND ARE AC-
CEPTED ON THE SAME KIND OF EVIDENCE, WHICH CON-
DIFFERENCES OF HIGHER CRITICS. 155
STITUTES THE DISTINGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS OF
THE HIGHER CRITICISM. Whether the dates can be
determined from the internal evidence is an essential
question, on which the main critical conclusions
depend. Opinions respecting the evidence which the
books present as to their dates and authors constitute
the great bulk of the higher criticism. The evidence
on the points about which the critics differ is similar
in kind to that used in support of the inferences on
which they agree. The evidence in these cases can
hardly be clear and conclusive, or it would not be
rejected by any able and independent Hebrew scholar.
To say the least, the proof is in most cases of such a
peculiar kind, and depends so largely on the mental
idiosyncrasy and theological standpoint of the critic,
that hasty acceptance or positive dogmatism is alike
unjustifiable. These differences of the critics go a
long way towards showing that, in many cases.
Biblical scholars have undertaken to decide questions
which can never be definitely settled, because of the
want of the necessary reliable data.
It is not, however, true that the points about which
critics differ are all of minor importance. If the
" Priests' Code " is not the late invention which the
higher critics allege ; if the book of Deuteronomy is
what, on the face of it, it assumes to be ; if the variety
of unknown authors and late dates, assumed by the
higher critics, is not justified by proper evidence,
but mainly rests on inconclusive conjectures — this
largely overthrows the whole scheme of the critics.
There is truth and pertinence in the remark of
156 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Professor C. W. E. Body: '' TIicho tlieories of literary
analysis, these methods of determining the dates of
ancient documents by mutual comparison, depend for
the most part upon the converfijent force of a number
of minute points, to which the minds of different men
will assign very unequal value. Thus even with the
trained perception of great scholars, the very same
phenomena will lead them at one time unhesitatingly
to one conclusion, and will be held at another to
indicate precisely the opposite."" The fact that such
wide differences exist among higher critics shows how
unjustifiable it is to speak of what modern criticism
has shown, as if there was perfect unity of opinion on
critical questions, and the term represented a definite
established result. It also shows that it is better for
Christian people to wait for convincing proof, than to
trust the ipse dixit of theorists.
The way in which many of those who assume to be
leaders in modern Biblical criticism have given up
opinions, which they once held with great positive-
ness, is not adapted to inspire confidence ; but on tlic
contrary teaches a lesson of caution. When we know
that a biblical critic was once just as confident of the
truth of some theory he has renounced, as he now is
of the truth of the view he has substituted for it, this
can hardly fail to shake our confidence in the critic
and his methods. In the edition of his " Introduction
to the Old Testament," published at Ley den in 1863,
Dr. Kuenen gave the date of the prophecy of Joel as
about 860 B.C. But as this book contains references
*" The Permanent Value of Genesis," p. 5.
DIFFERENCES OF HIGHER CRITICS. 157
to the Pentateuch, which do not harmonize with the
development theory, in the edition published in 1889,
he says Joel was written after 400 B.C. Cheyne,
Driver, Briggs, Sanday, and several others, farnish
striking examples of drifting and change of views,
which make one feel that they are not safe leaders.
In the forcible words of Bishop Blomfield, " We may
well ask what confidence we can be expected to feel
in a system of interpretation which, scarcely yet fifty
years old, has already gone through such serious
modifications ? or why we should be expected to
regard as final, conclusions which their own advocates
admit to be still in a state of chanixe and fluxion ? "
CHAPTER IX.
THE BEARING OF CURRENT THEORIES
ON OUR LORD'S TEACHING
AND CHARACTER.
Christ's Testimony to the Old Testament — New Testament Con-
ception of Messianic Prediction and Fulfilment — Our Lord's
Citation of the 110th Psalm — Three Theories Examined —
The Modem "Kenosis" Discrowns Christ — His Teaching
Not Disproved — Making Room for Rationalist Theories.
THE effect of the acceptance of the theories of the
higher critics, on faith in the unerring teaching
and divine character of our Lord Jesus Christ, is of
grave significance. In dealing w^ith this phase of the
question, we must avoid building upon our Lord's
references to the Old Testament Scriptures broader
conclusions than a fair interpretation of their mean-
ing justifies. Universal inferences should not be
drawn from particular references. But without any
straining of the import of these references, it may be
confidently affirmed that our Lord's recognition of
the Divine authority of the Law and the Prophets,
His citation of passages as conclusive on the points to
which they refer, and the conception of Messianic
prophecy and fulfilment, prominent in His teaching
158
CHRISrS TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 159
and throughout the New Testament, do not appree
with the theories of the evolutionary critics, concern-
ing the origin and cliaracter of the books of the Old
Testament. It is beyond question that the view of
the Old Testament, which the higher critics declare
to be quite erroneous, was universally accepted by the
Jews of our Lord's day, and, far from condemning it
as false, He assumed its truth in His teaching.
Even writers who repudiate the charge of being
Rationalists and claim to be evangelical, have adopted
views which compel them to deny that there are pre-
dictions of the historic Jesus Christ in the Old Testa-
ment prophecies. Professor Ladd, of Yale College,
says : " We have reason to doubt whether prophetic
inspirations ever results in the clear and definite
knowledge of some single occurrence which is to take
place in the future." Prof. Robertson Smith says :
"There is no reason to think that a prophet ever
received a revelation which was not spoken directly
and pointedly to his own time." Dr. G. C. Workman,
to whom I have fully replied in my *' Jesus the Messiah
in Prophecy and Fulfilment," says : " None of the
numerous Messianic passages in the Old Testament
refer directly or originally to the historic Christ, but
appear in the New Testament merely as quoted by
Him, or as applied to Him." ^ He also denies that the
53rd of Isaiah refers to the Messiah. No wonder that
Prof. Franz Delitzsch, in his last book, says : " It is a
depressing observation that Judaism has strong sup-
port in modern Christian theology, and that its
1 " Lecture," p. 448.
160 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
literature is like an arsenal out of which Judaism can
secure weapons for an attack on Christianity." ^
But the explicit utterances of the Lord Jesus Christ
directly contradict these denials of predictive refer-
ences to Himself, and of fulfilment by His Incarnation,
life and death. He said, " For if ye believed Moses
ye would have believed Me, for He wrote of Me."
(John V. 46.) " And beginning from Moses and from
all the prophets, He interpreted to them in all the
Scriptures, the things concerning Himself." (Luke
xxiv. 27.) " These are my words, which I spake unto
you, while I was yet with you, how that all things
must needs be fulfilled, which are written in the law of
Moses, and the Prophets, and the Psalms, concerning
Me." (Luke xxiv. 44.) It is utterly unwarranted to
call these declarations mere " applications " to Himself
of things that had been spoken of some one else by
the prophets. In the words of the learned Bishop
Ellicott : " Our Lord distinctly recognized the inspira-
tion of the prophets of the Old Testament, and the
predictive contents of their writings, and especially
their pervasive references to Himself, His work, His
sufferings, and His exaltation."^ When, speaking of
the Old Testament Scriptures, He says, " They are
they which testify of Me," it would be absurd to say
that He was merely applying to Himself things
spoken of others.
St. Peter explicitly affirms the same truth as his
Lord and Master when, speaking of the prophets, he
emphasizes the fact, that the Spirit of Christ which
"^ " Messianic Prophecies," p. 6.
' " Christus Comprobator," p. 168.
CNRISTS TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 161
was in them " testified beforehand the sufferings of
Christ, and the glories that should follow them." (1 Peter
i. 11.)
St. Paul says: " For I delivered unto you first of
call i;hat which I also received, how that Christ died
for our sins according to the Scrijptures.'' (1 Cor. xv.
3.) St. John says : " These things said Isaiah, be-
cause he saw His glory and he spake of Him.'' (John
xii. 41.)
In the Acts of the Apostles we read that the great
argument of the founders of the Christian Church, to
prove that Jesus was the Messiah, was the corre-
spondence between the prophetic predictions and the
work and sufferings of Jesus. He fulfilled " what
the prophets and Moses did say should come." The
irreconcilable contradiction between the words of our
Lord and the holy Apostles and the denial of pre-
dictions of the historic Jesus Christ, which has of late
been advocated as consistent with the orthodox Chris-
tian faith, can neither be disproved nor explained
away by substituting mere " applications " of pro-
phecy to events that were never predicted, and spiritual
realization for actual fulfilment in the New Testament
sense. If our Lord is right, this negative thecry of
prophecy and fulfilment is wrong.
The baseless notion that the New Testament con-
ception of prophecy and fulfilment is, that there is no
original predictive reference to Jesus Christ in the Old
Testament, and that the fulfilments, spoken of by our
Lord and the Apostles, are merely "accommodated
application s " to Him of things that were not spoken
11
162 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
of Him at all, is too utterly at variance with the plain
teaching of the New Testament to require refutation
or deserve serious consideration.
The Redeemer repeatedly refers to events and
statements, recorded in the Pentateuch and other
books of the Old Testament, as veritable historic facts,
in words that cannot be harmonized with the disinte-
grations of the higher critics. On several occasions
He speaks of Moses in a way that pL.inly means the
historic man of God, who said and did the words and
acts explicitly ascribed to him in the Pentateuch.
Our Lord asked the Saducees, " Have ye not read in
the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto
him, saying, " I am the God of Abraham, and the God
of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." (Mark xii. 26.) He
also asked : " Did not Moses give you the law ? "
(John vii. 19.) When asked a question about divorce,
He said : " What did Moses command you ? " (Mark
X. 3) — referring directly to the law in Deuteronomy
xxiv., a book which the critics ascribe to an unknown
author, who, it is alleged, wrote it hundreds of years
after the time of Moses. In these words, and when
He says : " Verily I say unto you, till heaven and
earth pass away one jot or tittle shall in no way pass
away from the law till all things shall be accomplished,"
it is impossible for any unbiased Christian to believe
that in this solemn declaration our Lord was speaking
of writings that were a Mosaic of fragments, written
by unknown authors, who ascribed them to Moses.
One of the most striking of our Lord's references to
the Old Testament is His citation from the 110th
CHRIST'S TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 163
Psalm, in which He assumes that in this psalm David
speaks of Himself. In propounding the question.. How
Christ could be the son of David and his Lord, He
said : " For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, the
Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand,
till I make thine enemies thy footstool." (Mark xii.
36.) This is recorded by three evangelists.
Three things are plainly assumed here : (1) That
King David was the author of these words ; (2) that
he wrote them by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit ;
(3) that they contain a distinct prophetic reference to
the Christ. To deny this is to take all the point and
relevant meaning out of our Lord's question and
argument. As Dr. Maclaren, of Manchester, says :
" Our Lord's argument is not drawn from the ' august
language' of the psalm, but from David's relationship
to the Messiah, and crumbles to pieces if he is not the
singer."*
But those who have adopted as their critical creed
the late dates of the Psalms, are bound on some pre-
text or other to deny the David ic authorship of this
Psalm. The Rev. G. C. Workman, following the
advanced critics, declares that this Psalm " contains no
direct reference to Christ," and that " its author was
not David, but a poet belonging to his time." As if
the explicit words of Christ may be thrust aside at
will, when they stand in the way of the theory of
certain modern critics.
No elaborate proof is needed to show that even
some of those who claim to be orthodox and evan-
* " The Psalms," Vol. III., p. 184.
164 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
gelical scholars, on this subject appear to reject the
authority of Him who spake as never man spake,
as an infallible Teacher of truth. Our Lord's concep-
tion of the Old Testament does not accord with their
evolutional theories, therefore something has to be
done to eliminate or explain away the force of His
words, and make room for their critical speculations.
Some writers, like Kuenen, frankly repudiate the New
Testament interpretation. Even where this is not
openly done, the line of argument adopted shows
plainly enough that these critics are against Christ's
conception of the Old Testament and reject it, because
it is against their critical conclusions.
In setting aside the words of the Redeemer relat-
ing to the Old Testament, when they express thoughts
which do not accord with certain modern theories,
three lines of argument have been used, which we
will briefly examine.
1. It is said that it was not the purpose of the
Saviour's teaching to deal with literary or scientific
problems. This is freely admitted. But it does not
follow that what He said was not true and trust-
worthy, when he expounded and applied the Hebrew
Scriptures. Neither did our Lord formulate a system
of theology. Nevertheless, He enunciated great
truths which shed light on the deep questions of
theology. When He said, "David himself said by
the Holy Ghost the Lord said unto my Lord," etc.
He is not dealing with a question of literary criticism.
He is expounding a prophetic declaration of His
eternal priesthood, which is fully treated in the
CHRIST'S TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 165
epistle to the Hebrews. That the Christ was David's
Lord, yet the son of David, was not a mere puzzle
to confound the Pharisees, but the unfolding of a
mysterious truth which was not understood till the
Great Teacher illustrated it in His own person. Call-
ing this a literary question, as if that would exclude
it from the sphere of Christ's teaching, is a weak
device. The real question at issue is : Were the state-
ments of Tesus, conveying thoughts assumed to be
truths by Him, true and worthy of confidence, and of
authority in deciding the matters to which they
relate ? The notion that He may be trusted in regard
to some things, but not in others, is doubtful and
dangerous. If the belief and teaching of the Saviour
on one subject may be rejected on such grounds, the
way is opened to reject His teaching on other sub-
jects, when it does not agree with modern critical
views ; and thus His authority as an infallible Teacher
would be undermined, if not positively rejected. To
those who make an unwarranted distinction between
the province of spiritual truths, in which Jesus is
admitted to be an infallible Teacher, and Old Testa-
ment history and exposition, regarding which they
deem His teaching unreliable or erroneous, our
Saviour's words to Nicodemus might fitly be addressed :
'' If I have told you earthly things and ye believe
not, how shall you believe if I tell you of heavenly
things?" (Johniii. 12).
2. Some theologians hold that our Lord knew the
alleged facts relating to the authorship of the books
of the Old Testament, as now held by the critics, but
166 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
that in teaching He adopted the popular belief, as
He did that of the sun's rising and setting, and spoke
as if the prevalent ideas on this subject were true.
This theory is seriously objectionable. So far from
Christ conforming His teachings to prevailing errone-
ous beliefs, He constantly condemned and rejected
them. The Saviour's reply to those who charged
Him with casting out devils by Beelzebub, has been
cited as an alleged example of His taking a false
popular view as if it were true. There is no parallel
between this case and His references to the Old
Testament. No reader can get the impression that
Jesus admitted He cast out devils by Beelzebub.
The question, however, is : Did Christ adopt such a
misleading practice in this use and application of the
words of the 110th Psalm ?
To suppose that the Son of God knew that David
was not the author of this Psalm, and that it did not
refer to the Messiah, and yet that He solemnly
declared what meant the very contrary, and based an
argument upon what He knew to be a false meaning,
is a conclusion from which we recoil, as inconsistent
with all our conceptions of the character of our Lord
and Saviour. Bishop Ellicott forcibly says : " We
unhesitatingly deny that the Lord's general teaching
as to the Old Testament, and those characteristics of
His teaching on the subject which all reasonable in-
terpreters would be willing to recognize, could by any
possibility be attributed to any principle of accommo-
dation in the ordinary sense of the word. That He
who was the Truth and the Light, as well as the Way,
CHRISTS TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 167
could have so taught in reference to God's Holy
Word, out of deference to the ignorance or the preju-
dices of His hearers, is utterly inconceivable."^' That
any " Christian scholar " should adopt such an hypo-
thesis, shows in what emergencies a preconceived
theory may place its adherents.
3. The chief method of justifying the setting aside
of the Redeemer's testimony to the Old Testament, in
this reference to the 110th Psalm and to other parts
of its contents, is by the adoption of such a view of
the " Kenosis " or voluntary ignorance of Christ, as
the critical theory requires. This is mainly based on
the single passage in which our Lord appears to dis-
avow a knowledge of the time of the end of the world.
We do not deny that some who reject the Davidic
authorship of this Psalm hold fast the idea that Christ
is an infallible teacher. Yet, as Dr. McLaren says :
" To maintain that in so important a crisis He based
His argument on an error comes perilously near to
imputing fallibility to Him as our Teacher."^
Canon Gore and others, however, cite all the places
in the Gospels, in which it is intimated that our Lord
expressed surprise, or appeared to ask questions for
information, as evidence that he was ignorant of
many things, and knew no more about the Old Testa-
ment than what was known to the Scribes and Phari-
sees of His day. Driver and Sanday take the same
view. The adoption of this line of argument is
a significant confession. If the results of higher
^"Christus Comprobator," p. 118.
«"The Psalms," Vol. III., p. 184.
168 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
criticism had not been contrary to " the mind of the
Master," it would not have been necessary to adopt
this hypothesis, as a means of discrediting His testi-
mony to the truth and authority of the Law and the
Prophets, in order to leave the way clear for the
scheme of modern criticism.
The great objection to this hypothesis of the
" Kenosis," as expounded by recent critics is, that it
implies a character of Christ widely different from
what is clearly set forth in the Gospels, taught by the
Apostles, and held by the Christian Church in all
ages. He was " the Light of the World," " God mani-
fest in the flesh," " the Way, the Truth and the Life."
He knew all men, and needed not that any should
testify of man, for he knew what was in man."
(John ii. 24.) He knew the past life of the Samaritan
woman, whom He met at the well. Peter's intimate
knowledge of His words and works gave him con-
fidence to say, " Lord Thou knowest all things." It
is of this Divine Teacher full of " grace and truth "
who " brought life and immortality to light through
the Gospel," and on whose infallible words the saints
of the ages have trusted for salvation, that it is
assumed He knew nothing of Old Testament pro-
phecy and fulfilment, but what he learned in common
with sinful mortals around Him.
One is almost forced to think that sincere and
scholarly men, like Sanday, Driver and Gore, whose
critical theories have driven them to adopt this
hypothesis of Christ's ignorance, for some cause do
•ot fairly realize the degree in which this dogma of
CHRIST S TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 169
the " Kenosis," as explained by them, tends to rob the
Son of God of the exalted character which attests His
claim to the full confidence of His people, as an infal-
lible Teacher and All-sutHcient Saviour. Most Chris-
tians must feel that the Saviour, which these critics
leave us, is not the Saviour in whom they have
trusted, and in the undoubted truth of whose words
they can rely in life or death.
The late Canon Liddon, after quoting Hooker's " Ex-
position of the Union of the Divine and Human Natures
in Christ," pertinently remarks : " It is in accordance
with this principle that the Church has hitherto be-
lieved Him to be an infallible Teacher, and especially
when He is touching on matters which, like the Old
Testament Scriptures, directly concern God's revela-
tion of Himself to man. To say that He shows no
signs of transcending the historical knowledge of His
age, is to imply that He shared with the rabbis around
Him grave errors respecting the real worth of the
Old Testament literature, and that He was in this
respect inferior to modern scholars who take the
negative side in questions of Old Testament criticism.
To assert that, while thus imperfectly informed. He
used and sanctioned the Old Testament as He did, is
to go farther ; it is to imply that, as a teacher of
religion. He was a teacher of error." "
It is a curious reason for protesting against appeal-
ing to our Lord's deliverances respecting the Old
Testament, that " the use of such proofs removes the
whole question from the historical and critical
^•' Sermon on Romans xv. 3, 4."
170 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
domain." If the truth of His testimony cannot be
disproved, its value and force cannot be denied or
discarded for any such reason. There are many
critical questions not touched or settled by our Lord's
testimony, which afford the critics a wide field for
the exercise of their powers of thought and research.
We have not referred to the bearing of the theories
about the Bible on the truth of Christ's teaching and
His character, with any thought of excluding critical
enquiry. But it will be time enough to invent lower-
ing views of Christ's knowledge, when the truth of
His words has been fairly disproved by adequate
evidence. This has never yet been done.
The Davidic authorship and Messianic character
of the 110th Psalm, against which some critics have
battled so persistently, and which has largely been the
occasion of developing this theory of the " Kenosis,"
cannot be disproved. It was not questioned by the
learned men of the Jewish Church of our Lord's time.
They were more likely to know the date and author-
ship of this Psalm than critics of another race and
language over 1800 years later. It has been rightly
said, had it been an error to ascribe this Psalm to
David, there must have been scribes there able and
willing to point out the error.
It is indeed said, that Jesus did not assert that the
Psalm was written by David. But the fact of the
Davidic authorship being assumed by Him as an
unquestioned truth that was universally believed,
strengthens rather than weakens the evidence of our
Lord's words. No good reason has been given for
CHRfSrS TEACHING AND CHARACTER. 171
denying the truth of his references to tliis PHahn.
Modern critics have not proved that Christ was in
error in ascribing this Psalm to David. That prince
of Hebrew scholars, Prof. Franz Delitzsch, afrinns
that the words quoted were " an utterance of David
regarding the coming Christ."
Bishop Perowne,in his "Commentary on the Psalms,"
says : " It seems to me, then, that we are shut up to
the conclusion that in this lofty and mysterious Psalm
David, speaking by the Holy Ghost, was carried
beyond himself, and did see in prophetic vision
that his son would also be his Lord." Dr. McLaren,
of Manchester, in his recent commentary, in the " Ex-
positor's Bible," after considering the contrary argu-
ments of Driver and Sanday, says : " Whatever the
limitations of our Lord's human knowledge, they did
not affect His authority in regard to what He did
teach; and the present writer ventures to believe
that He did teach that David in this Psalm calls Mes-
siah his Lord." In his last book — " Messianic Pro-
phecies" — Prof. Franz Delitzsch declares, that lie
knows no counter proof which would compel him to
correct the view he had previously expressed, in favor
of David being its author. If such a profound and
open-minded biblical scholar as Delitzsch knew of no
proof, to refute the historic belief respecting the
authorship of this Psalm, it must have been because
no such proof exists.
It is significant that the critics who have been so
much troubled over Christ's application of the 110th
Psalm, and other Old Testament Scriptures, have not
172 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
directly undertaken to prove, by proper and concluHive
evidence that tliin<;s atiirnied or aHSunied to be true
by Him are contrary to attested facts. But, instead
of doing HO, they have hibored to disparage the trust-
worthiness of His knowledge ; as if their main pur-
pose is to gain acceptance for a conception of His
character, that shall leave them at liberty to pro-
mulgate views that contravene His teaching. It can-
not be disproved that the acceptance of such theories
about the Old Testament, and the disparagement of
the testimony of Christ and His holy Apostles, tend
directly to undermine and set aside the authority of
the teaching of the New Testament.
NOTE.
It is sometimes alleged that there was nothing sufficiently
definite in the Old Testament predictions of the Messiah to
enable the people of our Lord's day to recognize Him as the
Christ. This is said in a way that virtually justifies the Jews
in rejecting Him. But this assertion is not true. St. John
says of the things he wrote concerning Christ : *' These are
written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son
of God." Simeon and Anna recognized Him as the promised
"Light to lighten the Gentiles," Andrew and Philip saw
evidence that they had "found Him of whom Moses in the
Law and the Prophets did write." Apollos "mightily con-
vinced the Jews, showing by the Scriptures (of the Old
Testament) that Jesus was the Christ. " Paul's method with
the people was, ' ' persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of
the law of Moses and out of the prophets." So convincing was
this evidence of the correspondence between the predictions of
the prophets and the fulfilment by Jesus of Nazareth, that "a
great company of the priests were obedient to the faith." (Acts
vi. 7.)
CHAPTER X.
EFFECT OF THE E VOLUTION THE OR V ON
FAITH IN THE TRUTH AND INSPIRA-
TION OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.
Sbitements f)f Higher Critics— Not Merely Literary Questions—
Theories which Affect Confidence in tlie Divine Authority
of Scripture— Harmful Effects on Christian Faith in
Europe— The Plea for " Christian Scholars" Examined—
Following Anti-Supernatural Leaders — Testimony of Emi-
nent Biblical Scholars on this Question.
HAVING shown that the main hypotheses, on
which the theories of the higher critics respect-
ing the dates and authors of the books of the Old
Testament are based, are not supported by adequate
proof, but that they are contrary to the chief facts
bearing on the questions at issue, we now proceed to
consider how the acceptance of these critical theories
affect faith in the trustworthiness and divine inspira-
tion of the Sacred Scriptures. This is a question of
vital interest ; for the beliefs of people, as to what
the Bible is, exert a determining influence on their
faith and life.
It is commonly alleged by the higher critics, that
their analytic criticism merely relates to literary ques-
tions of dates and authorship, which do not effect
173
174 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
faith in the divine authority and doctrines of the Scrip-
tures. This is the most usual way of silencing the
objections of those who express doubt, respecting the
tendency and influence of these critical theories. Prof.
C. A. Briggs, in an article in the Presbyterian Review,
says : " Whoever in these times, in the discussion of
the literary phenomena of the " Hexateuch," appeals
to the ignorance and prejudices of the multitude, as if
there were any peril to the faith in these processes of
the higher criticism, risks his reputation for scholar-
ship by so doing." Prof. S. I. Curtiss, writing in the
New York Independent, says : " If we accept the
views of modern critics regarding the origin of the Old
Testament as correct, so far as the evidence may seem
overwhelming, we do not thereby rob the Scriptures
of their divine character."
Dr. Driver says : " Criticism in the hands of Christ-
ian scholars does not banish or destroj^- the inspiration
of the Old Testament, it presupposes it ; it seeks only
to determine the conditions under which it operates
and the literary forms through which it manifests
itself."
However plausible such assertions may be, they are
misleading, because such words as "divine character"
and "inspiration" are used in an uncertain sense. It
is beyond all question that much current criticism,
by men who claim to be 'Christian scholars," does
not " presuppose " the inspiration of Scripture in the
Christian sense of that term. Professor Curtiss appears
to guard his aijsertion by requiring that the evidence
^Page XV.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 175
for what we accept be '' overwt ' ning." But this
does not affect the point at issue, iz., the effect of
accepting this theory on belief in the divine authority
of Scripture. The evidence being " overwhehning "
would be a good reason for accepting the new critical
conclusions ; but it would not determine what their
influence would be on the common Christian faith in
the divine authority of the Bible. It might be the
complete ov^erthrow of that faith. The effect depends
upon the character of the views, not on the amount
of evidence by which they are sustained.
The late Prof. E. C. Bissell, in his essay on " The
Pentateuchal Analysis and Inspiration," shows that
these moderate and evangelical critics, as they are
called, who assert so strongly that modern biblical
criticism does not affect Christian faith in the divine
authority of the Scriptures, make admissions which
greatly modify these assertions.
The New York Independent of July 30th, 1891, in a
friendly summary of the views of Professor Curtiss,
as given by himeelf in that paper, says : " So far as
historical errors or imperfect ethics and doctrine may
appear in the Old Testament, he maintains that this
appertains to the human side of Scripture ; because
God in His divine wisdom did not deem it necessary,
in making a revelation, that there should be anything
more than an honest attempt to transmit the facts of
history ; and in the character of Old Testament ethics
and doctrine God has had respect to the weaknesses
and limitations of men, who were not prepared for the
high demands of the New Testament." President W.
176 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
R. Harper, who is regarded by many as a moderate
and orthodox higher critic, says : " If there is an
analysis," which he admits, "the sacred record can no
longer be claimed to present a perfectly accurate
account of these early times, for conflicting accounts
stand side by side ; changes have been arbitrarily
introduced into the text ; insertions and omissions
have been made ; the material cannot be called in a
strict sense historical." -
Dr. C. A. Briggs, who so strongly contemns all who
allege that the new criticism imperils faith that he
assumes such an appeal could only be made to " ignor-
ance and prejudice," and therefore not to intelligent
loyalty to truth, referring to Deuteronomy, says :
"■ This seems to imply the Mosaic authorship of a
code of law ; but was that code the Deuteronomic
code in its present form. . . . All that is said may be
true, if we suppose that an ancient Mosaic Code was
discovered in Josiah's time, and that this code was put
" in a popular rhetorical form as a people's law-book
for practical purposes, with the authority of the
king, prophet, and priest."^
It will hardly be questioned that statements like
these by the same writers, in an important degree
modify the confident assertion, that modern criticism
does not " rob the Scriptures of their divine char-
acter," unless the words " divine character " are used
in some special new sense. We freely admit that it is
not for us to determine the manner in which God
2 Hehraica, October, 1888.
3'*Hexateuch,"p. 89.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 177
would reveal His will to his intelligent creatures.
This we must learn from the evidence of the Scriptures
themselves. We do not test the critical conclusions
to which we object by any preconceived idea of what
a revelation ought to be. We do, how^ever, affirm that
divine inspiration has been claimed for alleged modes
of composing and promulgating some of the sacred
writings, which, judged from a Christian standpoint
and conception of God's character, may be pronounced
human inventions rather than divine methods. The
story of the way the Book of Mormon was obtained
by Joe Smith, is amply sufficient to discredit its claims
to be a divine revelation, apart from the nature of its
contents. Assuredly the character of the methods
by which, according to the theories of the higher
critics, writers and " redactors " made up several of
the books of the Old Testament, so as to produce a
false impression respecting their authorship and the
historic facts, makes it impossible for ordinary minds
to believe that any writers were ever inspired by God
to do the things which the critics attribute to them,
and apologize for as morally right. If the book of
Deuteronomy, the Levitical laws, Joshua, Chronicles,
Ezra and Daniel were produced, as the critics repre-
sent, this implies a conspiracy, extending from age to
age, to mislead the readers of these writings respect-
ing the religious history of Israel. Those who say all
this was done under divine inspiration must use this
term in a new sense adapted to fit the new concep-
tion of Scripture.
We maintain that much of what is called results o f
12
178 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
" scientific " criticism, some of which have been set
forth in previous chapters, must be admitted, by all
unprejudiced Christian students, to be inimical to
faith in the truthfulness and divine authority of the
Holy Scriptures. It avails nothing to say that these
critical results do not contravene the doctrines of
Scripture. They may not do this directly, yet in
many instances they undermine and discredit the
foundations on which these doctrines rest. Do not the
testimony of prophets and apostles respecting the way
in which revelations of truth were given go them —
the belief that these revelations were written by the
holy men of old to whom they have been ascribed —
the trustworthiness of the religious history of the
Hebrew people — the truth of the conception of Old
Testament prophecy and fulfilment taught by our
Lord Jesus Christ and his inspired Apostles — as well
as the character of the truths taught in the Old Testa-
ment — constitute main grounds of Christian belief in
the reality and truth of the divine revelations contained
in these Scriptures ? We cannot disturb these founda-
tion stones without disturbing the faith that rests on
them.
The acceptance of the theories of the higher criti-
cism involves much more than literary questions. If
the distinguishing results of the theorizing critics be
accepted as true, this implies the acceptance of a new
and different belief, respecting the nature and
authority of the history and teaching of the Old
Testament. If Genesis is believed to be a clumsy
patchwork, compiled from contradictory accounts by
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 179
an incompetent or disingenuous redactor — if the Levi-
tical system is believed to be the production of priests
after the captivity, mainly designed to magnify their
own order — if Deuteronomy, with all its holy lessons
of truth and purity and important historic statements,
is not what, on the face of it, it purports to be, but an
artful fabrication of late date — if nearly all the books
of the Old Testament are believed to be a patch-
work of fragments, from unknown sources, by un-
known writers and redactors, as the " Polychrome
Bible " assumes — if most of the authors and redactors
of the historic books were the partial and designing
men which higher critics, who speak as if they knew
them, represent them to have been — if the Old Testa-
ment history is incorrect and misleading and must be
altered and set aside, in order to make way for a
different conception of the history and religion of
Israel than that given in the Hebrew Scriptures — if
the account in Genesis of the Fall and the First Prom-
ise, on which St. Paul's teaching on Depravity and
Redemption is based, is believed to be an allegory or
a myth — if the religious truths of the Old Testament
are held to be the outcome of the religious condition
of an " inspired people," and not the cause of that
condition — if prophecy is held to be something com-
mon to all the great ancient religions, as wel^ j,s to
that of Israel — if it is held that there is no oiiginal
predictive reference to the historic Jesus Christ in
Old Testament prophecy, and no actual fulfilment of
prophetic predictions by the events of the life and death
of the Lord Jesus, as recorded in the New Testament —
180 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
if the New Testament conception of the history
and religion of Israel is believed to be erroneous and
untenable — if the statements of our Lord and His
apostles, respecting the actual fulfilment of Old Testa-
ment predictions of the Messiah are to be explained
away, when they do not agree with the views of
some modern critics, either because they were ignor-
ant of the truth, or accepted and treated popular
errors as true though knowing them to be false — if
it is questioned, if not denied, that there are super-
natural predictions of future events in Old Testament
prophecy, whose actual fulfilment in later times is
evidence of the divine inspiration of the prophecies
which contained them — in a word, if these conclusions
are accepted as true, as they are by leading " higher "
critics and their disciples, it is quite futile for the
advocates of these views to imagine that they can
quiet the apprehensions and silence the objections of
intelligent Christians, who believe these negative
theories to be untrue and dangerous to Christian faith,
by asserting that the results of modern criticism do
not affect belief in the authority and inspiration of
the Bible — that they " pre-suppose it."
It is true that what men think or say about the
Bible cannot indeed destroy its divine vitality. But
it seems impossible to avoid the conclusion, that
important grounds of belief in the infallible truth
and divine authority of the teaching of the Bible,
would be undermined and discredited by the accept-
ance of these theories. It is not too much to say,
that the belief of these theories requires us to accept
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 181
a different Bible than the historic Bible of the Church,
and a different Christ than the Christ of the New
Testament, whom Apostles adored as the " Faithful
and true Witness," the " Prince of Life," and the
" Lord of Glory." The Bible we are asked to accept
by the critics is a mutilated Bible, largely composed
of books " cunningly-devised " to make a false impres-
sion, as to who were their authors and the time at
which they were written. And the Redeemer that
the critics leave us is not the infallible Christ " God
manifest in the flesh," but one who shares the pre-
judices and erroneous beliefs of His times.
The theories of these critics suppose what the late
Professor Bissell calls " the wholesale and intentional
falsification of the facts of Hebrew history." In
spite of the ingenious explanations and apologies with
which the alleged performances of Bible writers have
been defended, and the indignant denial that these
can be called forgeries, the acts which the school of
Wellhausen ascribes to the supposed writers of
Deuteronomy, Chronicles, and other books are fraudu-
lent and false. Professor Andrew Harper, of Austra-
lia, in a letter in the BritisJi Weekly, some time ago,
said : " So far as I know, there is no critical problem
in the Old Testament which shuts us up to the admis-
sion of any conscious deceit." We agree with this
statement. But this being Professor Andrew Harper's
view does not in the least degree . disprove the fact
that prominent leaders in modern biblical criticism
teach, that some of the writers of the Old Testament
substituted invented fictions for historic facts, and
182 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
deliberately ascribed their own productions to Mose.s.
How this could be done witho' t " conscious deceit,"
we must leave these critics to explain. The defence
of such performances, as deeds consistent with in-
tegrity, can hardly be regarded as creditable to tlie
apologists of these literary methods. Calling these
alleged doings of priests and " redactors " by pleasant
names does not change their actual character.
Dr. Driver, indeed, justifies the imaginary author
of Deuteronomy in attributing his work to Moses, on
the ground that this was consistent with the literary
usages of his age and people. It has been well said,
in reply to this assertion : *' He knows and can know
nothing whatever of the literary usages of the times
of Josiah, except what he learns from the books them-
selves which he is examining, and which profess to
have been written in, or to give an account of, those
times. He assumes, therefore, the very point to be
proved, namely, that a pious Jew in the reign of Josiah
would have felt himself ju. lied in putting into the
mouth of Moses a series of discourses, not one of
which, as he was well aware, Moses had ever uttered.
A more unfounded assumption was never made."
(Blomfield). This assumption becomes still more base-
less, when we keep in mind that there is no ground
to believe that Deuteronomy was written at the late
date named.
It is no relevant reply to this objection respecting
the hurtful effect on Christian faith, to say : " There
is no cause to be alarmed about the new criticism.
It can never overthrow the Bible." We are not
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 183
alarmed for the Bible. We firmly believe it will live
and triumph over all assailants in the future as in the
past. We believe this, not because we deem this con-
jectural criticism harmless ; but because we believe
all conclusions that are at variance with the biblical
conception of the sacred writings are erroneous and
untenable. If we believed these negative theories to
be true, we would not have this confidence. The fact
that these critical speculations do not deprive us of
the truths of revelation, cannot be placed to the credit
of the critics or their criticism.
The question is not whether the Bible will bear
this critical scrutiny or not. It is whether those who
accept theories which represent much of the Bible as
fictitious, written by unknown writers who lived long
after the events, who falsely ascribed their unhistoric
statements to eminent prophets in order to gain credit
for them, will not have their faith in the inspiration
and authority of these writings undermined. False
theories will not overthrow the Bible ; but they will
overthrow the faith of those who accept them as
true. It is utterly unjustifiable to say of the promises
of pardon, comfort, guidance, and strength, on which
Christian faith rests, that it matters not who are their
authors — whether Jesus, Isaiah, Paul, or some un-
known persons who falsely ascribed them to inspired
prophets or apostles. It is difficult to see any place
for " promises of God " in the patchwork Bible of the
critics. It is a fact, painfully illustrated in the his-
tory of individuals and communities, that the opinions
cherished about what some would call the literary
184 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
history and authorship of the Bible, liave prevented
its teaching; Troni exercisin"; its trans Ion iiiiiij inliuence
o w o
on tlie heart and life of those who accepted them as
true.
The practical influence it has exerted on thouf^ht
and life, where it has been fully tested, shows that
modern radical criticism touches much more than
literary questions, which do not effect Christian faith
or practice. Dr. Lyman Abbott is known to be strongly
in sympathy with the higher criticism. He has
written a book on evolution. Every intelligent reader
of this book and his other works, must have observed
that the author finds it necessary to alter and trans-
form the Christian doctrines he discusses, into some-
thing quite diflerent from what these doctrines meant
in the historic faith of the Christian church, in order
to adjust them to the theory of evolution. This is a
significant fact. Others must do the same.
On the continent of Europe, especially in Holland
and Germany, the practical consequences of the liberal
theology of the higher critics have been very notable.
Professor Kuenen, of Ley den, was one of the greatest
of the advanced critics. He is constantly quoted by
the critics of England and America as one of the
highest critical authorities on biblical questions. He
was probably the most candid, logical and outspoken
of the leading higher critics. The impression which
his teaching made upon his countrymen is therefore
of great significance; as what has happened to the
Master will probably happen to his disciples.
Prof. Howard Osgood quotes the following words
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 185
of Wickstced, the pupil, tnuislator, and friend of
Kuenen, written to explain tlie decline and failure of
his influence in Holland : " Towards the end of the
seventies the attendance in Kuenen'.s leclure-rooni
began to thin, and of those students who came many
were and remained orthodox. Kuenen felt the
depressincr influence of this change, and especially of
his inability to bring home to honest students the
truth of those views which, to him, rested on absolute-
ly irrefragable evidence. The explanation, however,
is not far to seek. When problems are directly con-
nected with religious faith, most men do not and
cannot take them simply on their own merits.
Kuenen's orthodox students admitted that they could
not refute his arguments, but they declined to accept
the natural inferences from them ; for there lay at
the back of their minds the conviction that Kuenen
was not a Christian theologian and, therefore, could
not grasp the whole bearings of any (juestion which
affected the Christian faith." It seems to us, that
there is more in this explanation than the writer fully
apprehended. Yet some who claim to be orthodox
and evangelical, quote Kuenen as an authority against
the fulfilment of Old Testament predictions.
The following words of warning against current
theories occur in a letter from Rev. Dr. Stalker, of
Glasgow, to Rev. George Adam Smith, published in
the British Weekly of February 18th, 1892. They are
not unnecessary in Canada and the United States. " The
truth is, the Dutch Church has been laid waste and
sown with salt. In 1888 there were over 300 vacant
186 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
churches, about a fifth of the entire number (Zahn),
and such was the neglect of ordinance that, out of an
adhering population of 175,000, at most only a tenth
attended worship.* You say that there is no fear.
Neither there is, in a sense. There is no fear of the
Bible being permanently injured ; the divine life in it
will assert itself and secure for it the position to
which it is entitled. But it is foolish to say there is
no fear for us. If we are reckless in circulating the
views which have washed other churches, what right
have we to presume upon immunity from the misfor-
tunes which have befallen them ? In point of fact,
it is easy to slip into the wrong attitude towards
Scripture, and to dwell so constantly on what is human
in it, as to lose the sense of what is divine. And such
a state of mind, once established in high places, quickly
spreads throughout the community."
It is surprising that at a time, when the pastors of
the German Protestant churches are revolting against
the rationalist speculations of the disintegrating col-
lege professors, because of their deadening influence
on faith and piety, so many in England and America
are eager to array themselves in the faded garments
of German negative criticism, as if this were an
evidence of mental superiority.
It may be replied to what has been here shown re-
specting the tendency and influence of the higher
criticism, that "moderate critics," such as Driver,
Bruce, Harper, Farrar, and others of their class, are
not Rationalists, but devout men who believe in the
Principal Cairns, in the Presbyterian Review, January, 1888.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 187
supernatural and hold the doctrine of the divine in-
spiration of the Scriptures ; and, therefore, what has
been here said does not apply to them. I have no
wish to deny these writers any credit due them for
avowing faith in the supernatural, and declining to
go the full length, on some points, with the more
advanced German critics. But the value of these pro-
fessions of faith is largely depreciated, when those who
make them avow beliefs that really contradict them.
Notwithstanding their admissions, they have adopted
views of the origin and nature of the Sacred Writings,
which are based upon the assumption that they are
the products of the religious and literary development
of the Hebrew people, like the ethnic religions.
Their critical scheme is not in harmony with the
Christian doctrine of supernatural inspiration, and
does not imply or require it.
Writers who accept the main critical theory of
rationalist critics, and ignore or minify the super-
natural in Scripture, even though they do not avow
disbelief in divine interposition in human affairs, are
justly classed with Rationalists. If any teacher or
author accepts the distinguishing critical conclusions
of this school of writers, his personal denials of
rationalist views, or avowal of orthodox beliefs, can-
not cancel the significance of his critical creed. In
spite of such denials and avowals, there is sometimes
what a recent writer calls an " evasion of the super-
natural on the part of men who profess to really be-
lieve in Christ and Christianity." " Evasion may be
perpetrated through simple avoidance of the point of
188 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
supernaturalisin in fact or doctrine, as the priest and
the Levite passed by on the other side. Or it may
be accomplished through ambiguity of expres-
sion, ostensibly affirming the supernaturalism in
question ; but really not affirming it, perhaps rather
suggesting an explanation that explains it away."
(Dr. J. McGreggor.)
It is a significant fact that Kuenen and Wellhausen,
the great masters and leaders of this critical school,
are really anti-supernaturalists whose critical scheme
is the outcome of the negative theology. They openly
reject the New Testament conception of the Old
Testament, as of no authority. Kuenen held that
" so long as we allow the supernatural to intervene
even in a single point, so long our view of the whole
continues to be incorrect." Yet these writers are
quoted as critical oracles by Driver, Sanday, Bruce,
Briggs, and others who are counted moderate and
orthodox. Dr. Sanday, though quoting him as an
authority, says : " Kuenen wrote in the interest of
almost avowed naturalism, and much the same may
be said of Wellhausen." Those who adopt the critical
scheme which has been originated, developed, and
advocated by men who do not believe in the super-
natural are almost certain to sink to the same level.
Men who accept the rationalist premises cannot con-
sistently reject the logical conclusions that follow.
As a recent writer remarks : " All people slipping
down a precipice do not go at once to the bottom.
Some catch at various outgrowths from the face of
the rock, and hang there precariously till they die ;
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 189
but many will find their way quite to the bottom,
whither all are heavily <ijravitating, and will die
there — wrecks." (Dr. E. F. Burr,)
The practical tendency of the acceptance of this
modern dissective criticism of the Old Testament, is
virtually to deny to the Bible those characteristics
which distinguish it from all other books. It is not
without significance, that unbelievers generally hail
the new theories of the Old Testament, as something
that gives them aid and comfort in their antagonism
to revealed religion.
The so-called " evangelical scholars" who are deemed
safe leaders, have all drifted away from critical views,
which they have held and taught since they deemed
themselves qualified to teach others. And they can-
not find a resting-place short of the goal of their
rationalist masters, which Cheyne has already reached.
Dr. Briggs, who has recently gone over to the Episco-
palians, has come out in favor of finding in the Church
of Rome the hope of Christian unity. What next ?
Kuenen and Wellhausen boldly carry out the evolu-
tion scheme to its logical results. Driver assumes
the same hypothesis, and generally adjusts his con-
clusions to it; but occasionally stops short of the
logical result of his theory. Canon Cheyne takes
him to task for this. Speaking of his "Introduction,"
Cheyne says : " The book is, to a certain extent, a
compromise ; the (partial) compromise ofiered cannot
satisfy those for whom it is intended ; even if it were
accepted, it would not be found to be safe."^ Cheyne
^Expositor, February, 1892.
190 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
holds that those who depend on Driver will be the
victims of an illusion, as to the actual results of
modern criticism. In other words, these results are
more radical aed revolutionary than Driver gives his
readers to suppose. Driver, indeed, is not irreverent
and dogmatic, like Kuenen and Wellhausen ; but he
adopts their main theory and uses their questionable
methods of adjusting the Old Testament records to
the demands of the theory. He sets forth doubtful
opinions and arguments of others, which tend to un-
settle faith in the authority of the Bible, on points
on which he himself gives no certain sound. In
accepting the main principles of the Graf- Wellhausen
school, and yet trying to evade some of their objec-
tionable conclusions, he takes an untenable position.
He is not as outspoken or as logical as Cheyne and
the more advanced critics ; but he is quite as likely
to unsettle the faith of those who take him as a guide
in the critical study of the Old Testament. The
critics who claim to be conservative and orthodox,
while accepting the main premises of the rationalist
leaders, are doing more to undermine faith in the
truth and authority of the Scriptures than the avowed
rejectors of supernatural religion.
Blomfield concedes that Dr. Driver guards himself
by the statement that institutions may have existed
in very early times, while the hooks that describe
them may be very late. But he adds : " Yet it is impos-
sible not to feel that without the ' Prologomena ' (of
Wellhausen) the ' Introduction ' (of Driver) could
never have been written ; and that Dr. Driver is com-
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 191
mitted to a substantial agreement with Wellhausen,
as to the unhistorical and untrustworthy character
of a great part of the Old Testament Scriptures.""
Prof. Howard Osgood says of Driver's Introduction :
" The highest praise that can be given to this work
is that it is a serious attempt to soften and adapt
Kuenen's methods and results to the foreign soil of
English thought." ^ If any one will take the trouble
to make a collection of all the critical points on which
Dr. Driver, either by avowal or implication, surrenders
the biblical conception of revelation and favors the
conclusions of the rationalist school, he will have con-
vincing evidence of the truth of these estimates of
his critical position.
If these " Christian scholars " adopt the methods
and the main theories of the rationalist critics of
Germany ; if they are drifting farther and farther in
the direction of negative views ; if they treat the
authority of Scripture lightly ; if their evolutional
hypothesis of the origin of the books of the Bible is
inconsistent with its inspiration in the Christian and
historic sense ; if they have accepted premises which
logically lead to essentially rationalist conclusions ;
and if they use the words " inspiration," "superhuman"
and " divine" in a new and misleading sense, though
they may be sincere in their purpose to reconcile
evangelical faith with the results of the higher criti-
cism, they cannot succeed in this task, because of the
concessions they have made to negative theories. The
« Page 29.
"^ Bibliotheca Sacra, July, 1893.
192 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
evolutionary theory of Wellhaiisen, Kuenen and
Cornill is the scheme of critics, who have come to the
study of the Bible with a disbelief in a supernatural
revelation. And those who accept so much of their
scheme, as is done by such followers as Robertson
Smith, Driver, Brings, Mitchell, Bruce, Harper, Cheyne,
and G. C. Workman, have no solid standing ground
for a belief in the Divine Inspiration of the Scriptures,
in the proper Christian sense of the term.^
Whatever may be true in the case of those who
have been brought up in the evangelical faith, and
afterward give their assent to the new theories about
the Bible, those who begin their religious life with
these low views of the inspiration and authority of
the Scriptures, are not likely to be distinguished by
strong faith in the saving truths of the Gospel. We
cannot minify and ignore God's interposition in the
affairs of His people in the past, without weakening
the ground of confidence in Him as the Answerer of
prayer in the present. Are young ministers whose
minds are filled with these unsettling speculations,
about fanciful "sources " and dissections of the books
of the Bible, likely to be made thereby " mighty in
^ The late Professor Kuenen 's position is thus stated by Wicksteed,
his disciple and biographer : "It was an attempt of singular bold-
ness and vigor to shake the tradition of Christian piety free from every
trace of supernaturalism and implied exclusiveness. It involved the
absolute surrender of the orthodox dogmatics, of the authority of
the Scriptures, of the divine character of the Church as an external
institution ; and, of course, it bases the claims of Jesus of Nazareth
to our affection and gratitude solely upon what history can show
that he, as a man, had been and done for men. — Jewish Quarterly
Review, July 1892.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 193
the Scriptures," and more successful in bringing sin-
ners into the experience of personal salvation ? Are
the preachers among the higher critics men who
magnify the grace of Christ and exercise a soul-saving
ministry ? Do they clearly hold and teach the doc-
trines of the Atonement, Regeneration, Forgiveness,
and the Efficacy of Prayer, as held in the evangelical
Christian churches ? It is hard to see how affirmative
answers can be given to these questions. It may be
admitted that men who have been savingly converted,
and have received a sound religious training, may
retain their religious faith after accepting rationalist
ideas on some points. But if such men retain their
faith, notwithstanding their acceptance of lax views
of the inspiration of Scripture, it would be un-
justifiable to claim the credit of this for the higher
criticism. It is really the result of their earlier
orthodox training.
If a " Christian scholar " who, according to Dr.
Driver, " pre-supposes " the inspiration of the Bible,
accepts and defends the belief that the Old Testa-
ment has been to a great extent made what it is, by
untrustworthy historians, incompetent or disingenuous
" redactors," and partisan priests, what value is there
in the assertion of such a scholar, that all this is con-
sistent with a belief in the doctrine of Inspiration ?
Is the admission of Inspiration, in some vague sense
in harmony with their critical theories, to make all
the crooked things straight, and cancel the effect of
their concessions to the rationalist theory of the
evolution of the Scriptures ?
13
194 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
It would be easy to give examples of the flippant
way in which the liigher criticism leads its votaries,
who are regarded as moderate and safe, to treat the
Holy Scriptures. Dr. Horton says : " The word of
the Lord comes to men to-day just as it came to the
prophets of Israel." He also speaks of " the most
striking of the mistakes into which the Apostle (St.
Paul), owing to the limitations of the most inspired
teachers, fell." Professor Bennett, somewhat patroniz-
ingly, says : " No doubt much that is most character-
istic and valuable in Christian thought is found in
germ and suggestion in the Jewish Scriptures."
Professor DufF, of Bradford, England, maintains
that we learn the mind of the Lord Jesus Christ, not
from what He is recorded to have said in the first
century, but from the thoughtful mind of Christians
of this 19th century. Appeals to the Bible must be
out of date with those who hold this view.
The Apostle Peter, on the day of Pentecost quoted
from the 16th Psalm the words, " neither wilt thou
suffer thine Holy One to see corruption," and speak-
ini> of David, said : " Therefore being a prophet, and
knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him,
that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh.
He would raise up Christ to sit on his throne: lia
seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christy that
His soul was not left in hell, neither His flesh did see
corruption.'' (Acts ii. 30, 31.) But the Rev. G. C. Work-
man says : " In this Psalm there is no reference what-
ever to the resurrection." "To suppose that Peter is here
interpreting the passage from the Pdalm, as though it
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 195
contained an idea of the resurrection of the Messiah, is
to overlook entirely the principle of apostolic applica-
tion or accommodation." That is, the Apostle's state-
ment does not agree with Dr. Workman's negative
theory, that there is no New Testament fulfilment of
prophecy by events that had been foretold coming to
pass, and therefore the explicit declaration of the
Apostle must be set aside as of no authority whatever.
Are the critical theories that result in this way of
treating the Holy Scriptures worthy of Christian
confidence ?
One has no difficulty in understanding the position
of those who openly regard the Old Testament simply
as ancient national literature, and deny that it has
any special divine authority. But it is certainly not
so easy to understand the position of men who are
regarded as learned and pious writers, whose teaching
divests the Bible of its divine characteristics and
regards the Book as being just what the rationalist
critics assume it to be, and yet maintain that this
lowering of its character does not affect faith in its
inspiration and authority.
To show that this estimate of the tendency and
effect of accepting the negative conclusions of the
higher criticism, is not merely my personal opinion,
I shall close this chapter with a few quotations from
distinguished biblical scholars, who strongly maintain
that the questions raised by modern criticism are not
mere literary questions, which do not affect belief in
the truth and inspiration of the Scriptures.
Prof. James Robertson, after asking the important
196 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
question, Whether the relation of the Old Testament
to the New would be the same, or whether Christian-
ity as a historically developed religion would have the
same value for us, if the historic facts of the Old
Testament were regarded as the higher critics regard
them ? pertinently says : " It is altogether inadequate
to reply to such a question (as Driver does), that
* criticism in the hands of Christian scholars does not
banish or destroy the inspiration of the Old Testa-
ment ; it pre8U2}po8e8 it.' Such scholars would do an
invaluable service to the Church at the present time,
if they would explain what they meant by inspiration
in this connection, and define wherein their position
differs from that of critics who profess no such
reverence for the Old Testament." "
The Rev. F. E. Spencer, in his essay in " Lex Mo-
saica " quotes Dr. Driver's remark in a sermon, that
" the moral and devotional value of the Old Testa-
ment — as indeed its religious value generally — is
unaffected by critical questions respecting the author-
ship or date of its various parts." After stating how
the source and support of its ideas are changed, he
says : " ' Critical questions of authorship and date,
may or may not affect the value of a series of writings.
It entirely depends upon the kind of critical questions
mooted. But to say that the critical questions now
in debate amongst us do not affect the religious value
of the writings called sacred by us, seems to stultify
the understanding."
Bishop Ellicott says : " An inspiration that can be
"♦•Early Religion," p. xi.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 107
compatible with continually attributing to God utter-
ances and enactments alleged to have been made to
Moses, when they were due only to an interested
writer, who was making use of the great Lawgiver's
name, is an inspiration that is outside all reasonable
and reverent consideration."
Principal Cave, who is as familiar with the German
and British literature of modern biblical criticism as
any theologian in England, says : " The recent attacks
of the 'higher criticism' upon the Old Testament
do not concern simply some relatively unimportant
bastion or trench ; they are directed against the inner-
most fortress, where floats the standard of Protestant-
ism, the first article of which justly is, 'The Divine
Inspiration, Authority and Sufficiency of the Ploly
Scriptures.'"^''
Professor Robertson also says : " At the same time
I am as firmly convinced that in critical discussions
on the Old Testament, as these have been conducted,
there is much more involved than the dates of I ooks
and the literary modes of their composition. What-
ever may be said of the 'traditional view' on these
subjects, it is to be remembered that the ' traditional
view ' of the history of the religion is the view of the
biblical writers ; and if it is declared to be incorrect,
our estimate of the value of the books must be con-
siderably modified.""
Prof. G. H. Schodde, in an article in the Treasury
Magazine y says : " The danger and harm of the
10" Battle of the Standpoints," p. 5.
11 Page vi.
198 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
Pentateuchal analysis does not lie in it as a merely
literary problem. And, indeed, this is not the heart
and soul of the problem at all ; this is but the pre-
liminary phase, the means to the end. This end is
the reconstruction of Israel's religious development."
Still more pointedly the late Professor Dwinell, in
his essay on " The Higher Criticism and a Spent
Bible," speaking of this class of critics, says ; " The
only inspiration possible under this theory is of a very
equivocal order, morally and spiritually ; for it is an
inspiration that does not keep the sacred writers from
making up a pretended framework of history, in
which to set their characters and instructions. It
does not interfere with their asserting things to be
facts which never took place. It does not stand in
the way of consciously antedating and representing
things as having occurred centuries before which really
occurred later, or of deliberately writing after the
events had taken place, and giving the writing the
form of prediction and passing it off as prophecy. It
does not stay the sacred authors from writing out
their own intuitions or experience, or thoughts and
reasonings, and claiming that these teachings came
directly from God. A kind of inspiration which
admits of all these duplicities and falsities must be
accepted as true, if this criticism is admitted. Surely
inspiration drops down to a low and ignominious
plane on this theory. ! "
Professor Whitehouse of Cheshunt College says :
" The results as presented by Wellhausen in the sketch
of the " History of Israel," contributed to the "Encyclo-
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 199
pedia Britannica," are obviously subversive of Biblical
authority ; and when we turn to the history recently
published by Stade, a disciple of the same school, we
find the early history of the Old Testament reduced
to a heap of ruins." ^^
The late Prof. E. C. Bissell, in his essay on " The
Pentateuchal Analysis and Inspiration," from which
we have already quoted, says : " The only ground
for surprise is that with the really tremendous change
of attitude toward the Bible, necessitated by this
treatment of it, Christian scholars who are fully
aware of this change should speak of it as 'harm-
less,' as theologically * natural ' in its effects ; should
say that any one who thinks there is peril to the
faith in these processes of the higher criticism ' risks
h? 3 reputation for scholarship ' thereby, and is still
able to use unmodified, the old formula that ' all Scrip-
ture is given by inspiration of God.' Undoubtedly
those expressions are quite sincerely made. Our sole
contention is that the words * Scripture ' and ' inspira-
tion,' as thus used, have never as yet been naturalized
among us."
The venerable Prof. W. H. Green, the Nestor of
Hebrew scholars in America, makes these weighty
and forcible remarks on this subject : " It does not
annul the inherently vicious character or the evil
tendencies of this hypothesis, that men revered for
their learning and piety have, of late, signified their
acceptance of it, and that they consider its adoption
compatible with whatever is essential to the Christian
^^ Expository February, 1888.
200 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
faith. It is a rouiarkable phenomenon, tliat in Euro-
pean universities eminent biblical scholarship has
been to so great an extent dissociated from faith in
the Scriptures in any evangelical sense. We may
wisely employ the Philistines to sharpen our spears
and our swords ; but we cannot join them in an assault
upon the camp of Israel. No more perilous enter-
prise was ever attempted by men held in honor in
the Church than the wholesale commendation of the
results of unbelieving criticism, in application both
to the Pentateuch and to the rest of the Bible, as
though they were the incontestable product of the
highest scholarship. They who have been themselves
thoroughly grounded in the Christian faith may, by
a happy inconsistency, hold fast their old convictions
while admitting principles, methods, and conclusions
which are logically at war with them. But who can
be surprised if others shall, with stricter logic, carry
what has thus been commended to them to its leafiti-
mate issue ?"^^
No matter with what acute learning or plausible
arguments the development theory of the Old Testa-
ment may be advocated, the trend of the movement is
unmistakably in the direction of a denial of the super-
natural. The conflict is becoming more and more a
battle of naturalism against belief in the direct inter-
position of a personal God in Hebrew history, or in
any human history. On this point Bishop Ellicott
pertinently observes : "Not merely that this modern
view tends to, or prepares the way for, a denial of the
13 OW TestameiU Student, July, 1887.
TRUTH AND INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE. 201
supernatural, but that it owed its very origin to the
assumption, that the existence of the supernatural in
these early records is exactly that which wrecks their
credibility."^^
The following weighty words, from the same emi-
nent author, are profoundly suggestive. After express-
ing surprise at the position of some respected writers
in his own church, Bishop Ellicott says : " If the
supernatural is to be minimised in the Old Testa-
ment, will it be long before the same demand will be
made in reference to the New ? To safeguard the
miraculous in the New dispensation, when criticism
has either explained it away or attenuated it in the
Old dispensation, will in practice be found to be
utterly hopeless. . . . The same spirit, that has
found irreconcilable difficulties in the supernatural
element of the Old Testament, will ultimately chal-
lenge the evidence on which the Incarnation rests.
The doctrine of the Word become flesh, the doctrine
which is the hope, light, and life of the universe will,
in the end be surrendered ; the total eclipse of faith
will have commenced, and the shadows of the great
darkness will be fast sweeping over the forlorn and
desolate soul."^^
14 << Christus Comprobator," p. 14.
^^lUd., p. 30.
CHAPTER XL
CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS.
Re-statement of Facts and Arguments in Previous Chapters
— Many Critical Conclusions Unreasonable — Advantages
of the Analytic Criticism Unduly Magnified — Prof. W. J.
Beecher on the " Books " and the " Sources " — No Moral
Power Gained by Dissecting the Books.
The subject we have been considering in the pre-
ceding pages covers such a wide range of topics that
many minor points have been left unnoticed. Yet we
think all unbiased readers will admit that the fore-
going chapters furnish conclusive evidence, that there
are weighty objections to the chief theories of the
modern divisive school of biblical criticism. The
facts we have stated are neither irrelevant nor unim-
portant.
Nothing has been said by us in denial of the right,
or value of the most thorough critical examination of
everything that can promote a fuller knowledge of
the books of the Bible, or against the acceptance of
all facts about the Bible, that are attested by proper
evidence. But it has been shown that there is a wide-
spread tendency to substitute indefinite language
about freedom of thought and modern biblical criti-
cism, for a definite statement and proper proof of the
202
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 203
views implied, and that are intended to be covered by
these general expressions.
The most characteristic theories of the evolutionary
higher critics, which imply a new conception of the
Bible, have been briefly but fairly stated. It has
been shown that, contrary to a widespread notion,
many eminent Hebrew scholars, who have vindicated
and exercised the right of free biblical criticism, have
gone over all the questions of the higher criticism,
and yet have seen good reason to reject the main
conclusions of the leading lights of this analytical
school.
I may fairly claim that it has been shown beyond
reasonable question, that recent archaeological dis-
coveries contradict the assumption of the crude literary
and religious state of the people of Israel, at the times
of Moses and David, on the strength of which late dates
have been assigned to a large part of the Old Testa-
ment.
No impartial reader will deny that the numerous
references to the Pentateuchal laws and records, in
the early writing prophets and historic books, con-
clusively disprove the idea that the silence of Scrip-
ture, and the recorded neglect of the Mosaic laws,
show that the Pentateuch was not known nor in exist-
ence during the chief historic period of Israel's
national life.
It will hardly be denied that what has been
shown, respecting the questionable methods and con-
tradictory differences of leading higher critics, gives
Sfood reason to distrust writers whose methods of
proof are so utterly unscientific.
204 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
In reply to the plea that hif^her criticism only deals
with literary matters of style, and form, and time,
which do not atfect faith in the inspiration and
authority of the Scriptures, it has been shown that
the higher criticism, by regarding the Bible as an
evolution, and by its assumptions respecting the origin
and authorship of several of the books, requires a new
conception of the Scriptures, which implies a denial
of characteristics that are main grounds on which we
believe their teaching to be invested with divine
authority. Nor can it be denied, that even those who
profess to believe in the supernatural, when they
accept the premises of the Rationalists, must also
accept their negative conclusions.
The relation of these critical theories, about the
Old Testament, to the infallible authority and divine
character of the Lord Jesus Christ is a matter the most
serious in its consequences. If the conception of the
Old Testament set forth in the teaching of our Lord
and His Apostles be thrust aside as erroneous, to
make way for the modern development theory, it is
impossible to see how the divine authority of the
New Testament can be consistently maintained.
It has been intimated in a previous chapter that,
in the opinion of many competent judges, the way in
which the higher critics try to solve Old Testament
difficulties creates greater difficulties than those they
remove, and requires the acceptance of more unreason-
able beliefs than those they reject. Have not the
facts, brought out in the previous chapters, fully justi-
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 205
fied this opinion ? Let us glance at a few of these
demands on our creduHty, which are implied in the
acceptance of current critical theories about the Old
Testament.
Though, as Dr. Sayce has remarked, in the case of
two authors, like Rice and Besant, who jointly write
one literary work in our mother tongue, it is impos-
sible to tell what each contributed, yet we are asked
to believe that modern critics, nearly three thousand
years after the writing of works in an ancient lan-
guage, with a very limited literature, can discover in a
book that has been regarded through the ages as the
work of one author, evidence of its composite charac-
ter ; and point out with confidence the parts contrib-
uted by the supposed authors and redactors, even to
assigning parts of the same verse to different writers
of different periods. Does the traditional view make
as great a demand on our credulity ? If redactors
and later writers altered and added to the documents
at will, how can our copies of the Scriptures be in a
condition that would justify modern critics in being
so confident as to what were the original sources ?
The late dates, assigned by these oritics to a large
portion of the Old Testament, assumes that the period
of Israel's greatest national prominence was a barren
period, that left comparatively no literary or religious
record ; and that the period of national decline and
enslavement, while their temple and city lay in ruins,
was the time of literary and religious fruitfulness.
Moses, David and Isaiah have been enthroned in
history and in the thoughts of men, mainly on the
206 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
ground of their being the authors of certain sacred
writings ; but we are asked by the higher critics to
believe,without a particle of historic evidence, that these
prophets were not tlie authors of the writings to which
they owe their undying renown. In other words, such
a Moses and such a David and Isaiah as the Old
Testament assumes and the Church has believed in, in
all ages, must be denied an historic existence, because
the theory of Wellhausen and his followers requires
the rejection of the historic belief respecting the
religion and history of Israel.
The critics who assign Deuteronomy and the Leviti-
cal laws to late dates and unknown authors, expect
us to believe that, though these anonymous authors
ascribed their work to Moses, to obtain a respect and
authority for their writings which they would not
otherwise have gained, yet Moses was not the author
of the laws nor the doer of the deeds, which had
invested him with the renown that made them desire
the prestige of his name for their work.
If we accept Canon Cheyne's theory of the Psalms
being all of late dates, we must believe that, although
David is enshrined in history and tradition as a poet
and psalmist, he has left us no poems or psalms. Or,
as one has expressed it, " that the poems David wrote
are lost, and that poems not his and not like his, dif-
fering essentially from his in character and spiritual
grasp, have been universally and from very early
times ascribed to him."
The critics who teach that the Levitical system was
concocted and organized at or after the time of the
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 207
Babylonian Exile, ask us to believe that, after the
great prophets had preached a spiritual religion of
truth and righteousness, and according to the higher
criticism condemned all sacrifices, such godly leaders
as Ezekiel and Ezra and their associates invented and
finally established, as laws given by God to Moses, an
elaborate system of ritual and sacrifices. Well may
Professor Streibert say : " That this work should be
foisted upon the people by Ezra and Nehemiah is
simply incredible."
Not less preposterous is the notion of the higher
critics that Deuteronomy was written by Hilkiah or
some unknown author, not long before Josiah's time —
that it was found in the temple and accepted by King
Josiah and all the people as the genuine work of
Moses ; and that a great reformation was carried out
on the strength of the belief that its laws were given
by God to Moses, as recorded in the book itself ; and
yet that this pious fraud was never found out by the
Hebrew people or any one, till it was unearthed by
the higher critics of the Nineteenth Century.
Those who call portions of Genesis " Babylonian
ideas," ask us to believe that though the literature
and religion of Israel are most ancient, and have been
beyond all question one of the most vital and influ-
ential moral forces known to mankind, yet that the
Hebrew people were behind others in religious intelli-
gence, and were forced to borrow their ideas about
the early history of mankind from their polytheistic
heathen neighbors.
Even if we leave out of sight the cogent critical
208 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
arguments, which have been urged against the chief
hypotheses of tlie most popuhir school of higher cri-
tics, it is not too much to say, that the unreasonable
and improbable character of many of the conclusions
they assume, constitutes a strong reason against accept-
ing theories and methods that are weighted with such
objectionable conseciuences, and re(|uire such ready
credulity on the part of those who accept them,
A great deal is said in current biblical literature
about the benefits conferred on the world by the
results of modern criticism of the Old Testament. It
is sometimes said that it has made the Bible a new
book, to those who have accepted the critical theories,
by investing its teaching with greater practical
interest, and showing that its admonitions and precepts
were given to meet the wants of living men of other
times. It may be freely admitted that the concentra-
tion of thought on the Old Testament, in recent times,
has given to many an enlarged view of the wealth
and preciousness of its teachings, apart from all critical
theories.
We have no disposition to deny whatever truth
there may be in these claims of the critics. Yet there
is good reason to believe that the advantages to the
interests of religion, which have been claimed for the
new criticism, have been very much exaggerated.
The good results have been more indirect than direct.
Anything that causes more general and close study
of the Word of God must prove an advantage. But
the advantages are largely counterbalanced by the
. CONCLUDING REMARKS. 209
unsettling tendency of the critical speculations of the
advanced critics.
The main advantages that may be claimed for the
modern critical study of the Bible are these:
1. The thorough sifting of the character and claims
of the Scriptures will, we firmly believe, result in their
fuller vindication, and this will give a firmer basis to
faith in their divine character and authority. When
the Bible emerges out of the keen critical controver-
sies of our times, like gold tried in the fire, this will
give a strong ground for confidence that no future
assaults on its truth and integrity will be more
successful than those of the past.
2. A still more direct and practical result of modern
study of the Bible is, that a fuller knowledge of the
occasions of the prophecies and other parts of the
Scriptures gives a deeper human interest to lessons
of truth, spoken to " men subject to like passions as
we are." This, however, is no modern discovery, and it
should not be so stated as to ignore or obscure the
great truth declared by St. Paul, that " whatsoever
things were written aforetime were written for our
learning, that we through patience and comfort of the
Scriptures might have hope." (Rom. xv. 4) There
can be no question that it adds greatly to the interest
of any prophetic message to know the occasion of its
deliverance, and the condition of those to whom it was
addressed. We read the book of Ezekiel with greater
interest, when we bear in mind that his message was
delivered to the captives in Babylon. The admoni-
tions and threatenings of Malachi are invested with
14
210 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
greater force, when we note their pointed adaptation
to the moral condition of the people in the time of
the restoration under Nehemiah. The epistle to the
Philippians acquires a deeper significance when it is
read in the light of the circumstances under which
Paul and Silas founded that church.
But there is a serious drawback to the advantage
of this interest arising from the times and occasions of
the writings. As I have said in another place, "just
because the occasion of a prophecy or Psalm enhances
its interest, many writers have invented imaginary
settings for portions of the Old Testament, which have
no historic foundation," but are mere conjectures
made to help out some fancy hypothesis. There is
certainly not much gain in accepting Canon Cheyne's
denial that David wrote the 23rd Psalm, or in his
gratuitous ascription of the 110th psalm to Simon
Maccabeus, and many similar conjectures that are
equally baseless.
3. The Old Testament might be made a " new book,"
without being made a better hook that would be a
gain to the Christian faith. If it were made " a new
book," by divesting it of characteristic qualities that
vindicate its claim to be received with confidence, as
a book containing a true history of Israel and divine
revelations of religious truth, such a change would
certainly make it a different book. This, however,
would be loss and not gain.
The preposterous claim that the negative view,
which denies that the Old Testament prophecies
contain predictions that foretell the historic Jesus
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 211
Christ, gives greater einphasi.s to the ethical and
religious teaching of prophecy than the orthodox
view, has no foundation in fact. The really valu-
able biblical criticism is that which gives the best
rendering, and the truest exposition of the meaning
of the Holy Scriptures. But this work has been
much more largely accomplished by evangelical
scholars than by the dissecting theorizers. It is not
true that the "higher critics" have given greater
prominence to the religious teaching of the Old
Testament than orthodox expositors. These critics
in their work give few signs of being impressed by
the spiritual and divine elements in prophecy.
Speaking of Kuenen and Wellhausen, an English
divine says : " It has apparently escaped them both
that there is anything high in idea, noble in motive,
regenerating in social influence, in the literature
which they have set themse?"^es to dissect." (Rev.
F. E. Spencer.)
Everything that brings out the meaning of the
Scriptures should be prized and commended; hut we
have seen that the chief work of the evoliUionary
critics consists in dissecting the books^ that have been
regarded as connected records written by certain
Hebrew prophets, and ascribing fragments of them
to different imaginary authors, of whom no one has
ever heard ; but who are assumed to have written at
a late period that renders their statements of doubt-
ful historic value.
It has been shown that many eminent professors of
the Old Testament language and literature, who stand
212 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
in the front rank of Oriental scholars, repudiate most
of the conclusions of the dissecting critics, who build
so largely on what they call internal evidence.
The advantage of the dissection is by no means
clear. As a recent writer has said, " It is altogether
unreasonable to suppose that the mere pulling of the
Old Testament Scriptures to pieces, and putting them
together again, must of necessity add a vast deal to
our comprehension of their contents." (Lias.) Sup-
posing, for argument sake, that all these conjectural
theories about authors and redactors were facts, what
great benefit could this bestow ? It would be a
matter of literary interest, no doubt. But, leaving
oi't of sight the fact that these critical guesses
merely give "a local habitation and a name" to
such "airy" beings as E, "E, J, -J, J E, D, P, iR,
2R, ^R, and all the rest of the redactors which
the rationalist theories require, it is by no means
clear how this assignment of fragmentary " sources "
adds any elements of spiritual or moral power to
the Sacred Writings, or how it would tend to make
them exert a mightier religious influence in the
future than they have done in the past. We have
seen that its tendency is to have a very contrary
effect.
A very suggestive article on this phase of the sub-
ject, by Prof. Willis J. Beecher, of Aubi "n Theological
Seminary, appeared in the Bibliotheca Sacra for
last April. After stating the attitude of the two
schools of biblical scholars towards the Old Testament,
Professor Beecher shows that the conservative scholars
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 213
deal chiefly with the books of the Old Testament
themselves, as we find them in the Bible. The higher
critics deal mainly with the supposed " sources " on
which these books are based. He thinks both books
and " sources " should be studied. But he deems the
books themselves much more important than the
alleged " sources." Professor Beecher maintains that
the study of the " sources " is for the sake of the
books, and that the books present a large field for
study, in addition to all possible study of the " sources."
As he shows, it was the Old Testament, as we have
it, that was " the law and the testimony " of the
Jewish Church. These books were the " Scriptures "
to which Christ and His Apostles appealed as possess-
ing divine authority. It was the Old Testament, as
we have it, that has been revered and cherished by
the Christian Church through the centuries It was
these books, without regard to the " sources," that
have been the great moral and spiritual power that
transformed individuals and communities. It is these
books, alleged by the critics to be a patchwork of
discordant fragments by unknown scribes, whose
literary beauty and sublimity have called forth the
admiring eulogies of the greatest thinkers and writers
of the ages.
Even if we leave out of sight altogether the very
questionable kind of evidence, by which the dissec-
tions and conjectural sources are supported, there is
not a shadow of reason to believe that the " Poly-
chrome Bible," with all its rainbow hues, will give
men truer conceptions of God's will, be more potent
214 THE BIBLE UNDER HIGHER CRITICISM.
to quicken the conscience, brin^^: richer messages of
peace and pardon to the sorrowing and sinful, or be a
mightier life-giving power to the children of men, than
the undissected old Bible, whose words of life, from
age to age, have been the power of God, making mul-
titudes " wise unto salvation."
NOTE.
In the foregoing chapters we have not advocated any specific
theory of Inspiration. It is the authenticity and trustworthi-
ness of the Sacred Writings, rather than any theory of Inspira-
tion, that are assailed by Rationalist criticism. We know
nothing of the manner in which religious truths and future
events were revealed to the prophets, except from what they
tell us themselves. The manner of their inspiration is quite
secondary to the fact. The main questions are : Did God make
special revelations to prophets and apostles, beyond what
human reason could discover, and distinctly different from the
manifestation of the Spirit given to pious souls in all ages ?
Was the development of religious knowledge in Old Testament
times the result of fuller revelations of His will made to pro-
phets and inspired messengers, and not an evolution, resulting
from the moral and literary advancement of the Hebrew people '\
All who are true to the teaching of the Bible must answer
these questions with a decided affirmative.
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