§ 5. Some Remaining Difficulties
WE MUST ACCEPT THE WHOLE OR REJECT THE WHOLE
The orthodox and traditional view of the Old Testament is preserved in the unrepealed “Blasphemy Act,” 9 and 10, William III., cap. 32, which enacts that any person who shall deny the “Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament” to be of “divine authority” shall be incapable of holding any public office or employment, and shall, on a second conviction, also suffer imprisonment for a space of three years. The Vatican Council of 1870, “speaking under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost,” declared that the books of the Old and New Testament “have God for their author, and, as such, have been delivered to the Church.” The Council, therefore, ordained that the man should be anathema who refused “to receive, for sacred and canonical, the books of the Holy Scripture in their integrity, with all their parts.”
Dr. Bayley expressed the opinion of his day when he wrote77: “The Bible cannot be less than verbally inspired. Every word, every syllable, every letter, is just what it would be had God spoken from heaven without any human intervention. Every scientific statement is infallibly correct; all its history and narratives of every kind are without any inaccuracy.”
Listen, again, to the words of a well-known divine of our own Church, spoken but yesterday: “The whole of the teaching of the New Testament is based upon the supposition that God made a covenant with Abraham.”78 “You have our Lord Jesus Christ building His whole life on the Scriptures, and submitting to death in obedience to them.”79 This is the strictly orthodox opinion, and it is consistent with Christian doctrine. Yet, for obvious reasons, the Old Testament is now regarded as an incubus by an increasing number of earnest Christians.
In the New Testament there are many cruel sayings attributed to Jesus. Only the few are to be saved from the eternal torments of the damned (St. Matt. xiii. 10–13, xxii. 14, xxv. 41; St. Mark iv. 11–12, xvi. 16, etc.). Happily, owing to the rise of Rationalism and the consequent subjection of the Bible to criticism, the dogma of eternal torment is disputed on all sides, and the Athanasian Creed will soon no longer be forced upon us. The principle of the “chosen few” is so clearly Christ’s teaching, and furnishes such a convenient explanation for the attitude of the many, that it is commonly adhered to; but liberal theologians no longer hold that “he that believeth not shall be damned,” or that the punishment of the sinner is to be excruciating torture for all eternity. Unbelievers and sinners may all ultimately be saved, or at the worst their existence will end with this life. Good, very good; such views appeal to us as being more humane and rational; but are they compatible with the truth of the Bible? Mark the words of the late Bishop of Manchester: “The very foundation of our Faith, the very basis of our hopes, are taken from us when one line of that sacred volume, on which we base everything, is declared to be untruthful and untrustworthy.” Thus it is that there are many who would still retain the inhuman doctrines ascribed to the Master. Fearful of losing the basis of their hopes, and unconscious, apparently, of their sublime egoism, they reason, and reason with logic: We must accept the whole or reject the whole.
SILENCE OF HISTORIANS
That the Bible should be open to criticism at all seems to me inconceivable if it really be God’s gift to mankind. How could God, having determined after æons of time to make a definite revelation of Himself to His human creatures, permit the account of this revelation to be handed down in such a haphazard fashion that future generations cannot be sure that they possess a reliable record? This, too, when a trustworthy record was the more essential on account of the miraculous nature of the narrative. As Professor Schmiedel remarks, the meagreness of the historical testimony regarding Jesus, whether in canonical writings outside of the Gospels or in profane writers such as Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny, is most pronounced. Not a single passage can be produced from the writings of the great historians and philosophers who flourished between A.D. 40 and A.D. 140 which makes the slightest allusion to the astounding phenomena connected with the birth, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth.
It was at one time claimed that Josephus spoke of Jesus. That this has been given up by theologians may be verified by a reference to Canon Farrar’s Life of Christ, vol. i., p. 63 (and p. 31 of the cheap edition), where we read that “The single passage in which he (Josephus) alludes to Him is interpolated, if not wholly spurious.” There is also a disputed passage80 in Tacitus, where he speaks of Christians having “their denomination from Christus, who, in the reign of Tiberius, was put to death as a criminal by the procurator, Pontius Pilate.” And that is all! Could anything be more disappointing than this must be to thoughtful Christians who wish to establish the historical accuracy of the miraculous story of God’s life on earth? Eusebius (A.D. 315–340), the celebrated ecclesiastical historian, is apparently reduced to appealing to a Pagan oracle for a proof of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, for he says to the heathen: “But thou at least listen to thine own gods, to thy oracular deities themselves, who have borne witness, and ascribed to our Saviour (Jesus Christ) not imposture, but piety and wisdom, and ascent into heaven.”
The silence of secular historians is accounted for, by certain divines, by falling back on a theory of hostility or contempt. Thus Dean Farrar thinks that Josephus’s silence on the subject of Jesus and Christianity was as deliberate as it was dishonest (see his Life of Christ, vol. i., p. 63). Except that this offers a much-needed explanation, I am not cognisant of any reason for suspecting the famous secular historian, although, of course, the untrustworthiness of the Christian historians is notorious. Eusebius, for example, the gravest of the ecclesiastical historians, confesses, with commendable frankness: “We have decided to relate nothing concerning them [the early Christians] except the things in which we can vindicate the divine judgment.”81
With regard to the prodigy of the darkness, etc., that occurred at the death of Jesus, Gibbon informs us as follows: “It happened during the lifetime of Seneca and the elder Pliny, who must have experienced the immediate effects, or received the earliest intelligence of the prodigy. Each of these philosophers, in a laborious work, has recorded all the great phenomena of Nature—earthquakes, meteors, comets, and eclipses—which his indefatigable curiosity could collect. But the one and the other has omitted to mention the greatest phenomenon to which the mortal eye has been witness since the creation of the globe.”82 Any attempt to explain this away by supposing that the darkness of three hours was local only detracts from the magnitude of the miracle, which was intended, by its very magnitude, to be one of the proofs of the death of a God.
THOUGHTS ON “TRADITION” AS GOD’S METHOD FOR THE TRANSMISSION OF TRUTH TO POSTERITY
Have you ever, in the days of your early youth, played the game of “gossip”? It is an amusing game, and also points a moral. A number of persons put themselves in a long row, and the first will think of some little incident, which he will carefully whisper to his neighbour, who will then pass it on, and so on, and so on, till it reaches the last person, who will proceed to repeat out loud the story he has heard. The original story will then be divulged, and much amusement is caused by the differences that are found between the two stories. This illustration of what occurs in “gossip” came back to my mind with much misgiving when I first heard how the story of my Saviour’s life on earth was handed down for a long period “by tradition.” Apparently, Christian theologians look quite complacently, and without any misgiving, upon this process for the transmission of the Christian verities; but, for myself, whether it were a century, or whether it were only a matter of thirty or forty years, before the final committal to writing, it was a heartrending discovery, and all my confidence in the truth of the Bible story was shaken. My dismay was not diminished when I learnt also that it was extremely doubtful whether the authors were eye-witnesses of the events, or especially inspired by God for their task; also, that there had been subsequent interpolations by equally unknown and uninspired writers, who, to speak plainly, were nothing more nor less than forgers, actuated, possibly, by pious motives. That the writers of the Gospels were vouchsafed any unusual facilities through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is discredited by the remarks of the apologists themselves. Thus, Dr. Robinson, in his book already referred to, alludes to St. Peter’s illiteracy, St. Mark’s poor literary attainments, and the limitations to which all the evangelists in ancient times were subjected.
We find ourselves asking the questions, “Did not God know that a time would come when we should discover that nature’s laws were not of the fragile or elastic character which our forefathers had supposed? Did He not know that we should therefore require absolute proof before we could believe that they had been broken in a bygone and credulous age?” Instead of this, the only proofs afforded us are copies of documents concocted from hearsay—we are not sure when or by whom—and from time to time fraudulently manipulated by interested though “pious” forgers. Did He, in His Omniscience, purposely allow events to take their course, and intend the story of His Son’s life upon earth to be handed down to us by the same unsatisfactory process as that of many another ancient tradition now known to be historically worthless? If ever special interference with the course of nature were necessary, surely it would be here—a miracle to prove the miracle on which our hopes are staked. Or, if this be asking too much, if it be argued that it is no longer God’s pleasure to break the laws which He has made, and that He now accomplishes His purposes by means of these laws only, how comes it that, for the safeguarding of this great truth, the most ordinary precautions have been neglected?
We are often asked to consider the yearnings of man as a proof that the thing yearned for is a reality. His yearnings, therefore, are not a negligible quantity. Do not, then, the yearnings of millions of Christians in the Roman Catholic and Greek Churches for miraculous proofs of God’s residence once upon earth count for something? Are not all the “miraculous” relics and “wonder-working” ikons a proof that man feels that God’s revelation ought to be assured to us by the continuance of miracles? In our own Church, Holman Hunt’s painting of “The Light of the World” is being sent round our colonies, to strengthen people’s belief in Jesus Christ. Why, oh why, have we not the real picture of our Saviour, bringing our God nearer to us, and enabling us to focus our thoughts on Him? I once mentioned my feeling on this subject to a clergyman, a doctor of divinity, well versed in Church history. He replied by suggesting that there was a tradition which indicated that the true likeness of our Lord had been miraculously transmitted, and that from this the great Italian painters had caught their inspiration.83 It seems hardly necessary to have recourse to the supernatural when there were natural sources available in the shape of representations of pagan gods. Thus Mercury, attired as a shepherd, with a lamb upon his shoulders, was no infrequent object in ancient art, and this has, in some cases, led to a difficulty in distinguishing between Mercury and Jesus Christ. Similarly we know that the pictures and sculptures wherein Isis is represented in the act of suckling her child Horus formed the foundation for the Christian figures and paintings of the Madonna and child.
THE ALLEGED SINLESSNESS OF JESUS CHRIST
It may be urged that we have, what is of far more importance, the picture of His character. Have we? The absolute sinlessness of Christ is one of the chief proofs held out to us of His divinity. It is described as being in itself a miracle so great that it furnishes us with sufficient grounds for belief in other miracles. Many pious and learned theists feel that the character of Christ as portrayed in the Gospels betrays imperfections. But let this pass. What do we know of His life? Let us assume that in the Gospel of St. Mark we are put in possession of the impressions of an eye-witness. St. Peter’s personal knowledge of the private life of Jesus was confined to his recollections concerning a beloved Master during the period of His public ministry. And that ministry extended over one year, or at most three years. Have not the disciples of great teachers in the past invariably extolled the perfections of their masters? Have they ever dwelt upon their imperfections? Has not the picture handed down by tradition, and afterwards committed to writing, often been that of a perfect man? That the writers of the Gospels recognised the need for Christ to appear sinless, and adopted questionable methods for their purpose, is only too evident. Dr. Robinson explains84 the disappearance from the other Gospels of St. Mark’s references to “anger,” “grief,” “groaning,” “vehemence,” etc., as being “the result of a kind of reverence which belonged to a slightly later stage of reflection, when certain traits might even seem derogatory to the dignity of the sacred character.” Comment is superfluous.
THE IGNORANCE OF JESUS CHRIST
There is another difficulty of belief in the divinity of Christ, which it is all the more essential to bring into prominence because it usually receives but scant notice from the pulpit. I refer to the “ignorance” of Jesus Christ. In a review of Le Réalisme Chrétien et l’Idéalisme Grec, par L. Laberthonnière, the Church Times praises the Abbé’s conception of Christian realism, and then goes on to say: “Here is found the key to the mystery of the ignorance of Jesus Christ, and of the other limitations attributed to Him in the Gospels. There are two untenable theories—the one that He deliberately kept things back from His disciples; the other that He was Himself ignorant of His own true nature, which afterwards became known to the Church. The truth is that He had to reveal Himself by living among men, and not by giving them an abstract doctrine about Himself—a doctrine which must have been either inadequate because adjusted to their comprehension, or else incomprehensible because adjusted to a reality which was beyond them.” The plain question, however, is—Had He, or had He not, the attribute of Omniscience? Did He, or did He not, know what we now know? Are we to suppose that He pretended to be ignorant? Was He God or was He man? The usual answer is that, as Very Man, He had only the knowledge of His age (or, should we not say, of the very restricted environment selected by Himself for His activities upon earth?), but that as Very God he performed miracles, taught spiritually, as never man taught, and was sinless. This answer, however, would not be accepted by the Venerable W. M. Sinclair, Archdeacon of London, who conjectures that “when our Lord said, ‘Greater works than these shall ye do,’ He was perhaps thinking of the marvellous discoveries of surgeons and physicians in times of advanced science” [!].85 Nor would it be accepted by the Rev. David Smith, who holds that Jesus accommodated Himself to the popular idea, and “after His wont fell in with the delusion” [!].86
Surely an Omniscient God must have known that grave doubts would arise in the future from the real or apparent ignorance of His Son, and, vice versa, that any prescience shown by Him would be hailed with delight as a proof of His divinity. If it be urged that such trials of faith are useful, why should it be the thoughtful of future generations who are chiefly to be so tried? If Christ had chosen His disciples from among the “wise men of the East” (or West), instead of from among men of the lowest order of intelligence and education, there would then have been no necessity for the doctrine to “have been either inadequate because adjusted to their comprehension, or else incomprehensible because adjusted to a reality which was beyond them.” Only a very small and remote corner of the world was favoured by the presence of God when revealing Himself in human form for the benefit of mankind. Only the most ignorant, for the most part, heard His personal teaching. Had He revealed Himself to all, or to a far greater number of persons then living, and satisfied the ardent longings of the wise men and philosophers of those times, would this not have conduced to the rapid recognition of Christianity and to its firm establishment over the whole world for all ages?
The tiny Sea of Galilee, the birthplace of the Gospel, is only about twelve miles long and seven miles in its widest part, and Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum were all situated close together at the northern end. Here Jesus made his permanent home after His fellow-townsmen at Nazareth had rejected Him; here He preached, and here He performed many mighty works. Not till I had visited the spot did I fully realise the insignificance of the area to which the Saviour of mankind confined His ministry. Round the lake stood such important cities as Tiberias and Taricheæ. They were studiously avoided by Jesus. (This would account, perhaps, for their great men hearing nothing of the new teaching, though hardly for their hearing nothing of stupendous miracles performed at their very door.) The cities of the Decapolis were also flourishing in this neighbourhood at the time of Christ’s ministry, and were the centre of great literary activity. Gadara produced Philodemus the Epicurean, a contemporary of Cicero; Meleager the epigrammatist; Menippus the satirist; Theodorus the rhetorician, the tutor of Tiberius; and others. Gerasa, also, was a mother of great teachers. In the words of George Adam Smith: “Philodemus, Meleager, Menippus, Theodorus, were names of which one end of the Lake of Galilee was proud, when Matthew, Peter, James, and John were working at the other end.”87 If it be argued that for some inscrutable reason God sent His Son only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel and intended His preaching to reach the Gentiles through the medium of His chosen people, why was such a learned and pious Jew as Philo left out in the cold?
Apologists do not explain at all convincingly why the Almighty could not, or preferred not to, make Himself understood. If He could say “Let there be light,” He could also have said “Let there be knowledge.” Besides, after all, what is there in the broad facts of modern science which could not be explained to an intelligent savage to-day? The shape and movements of the earth are explained in the most elementary geography books, and the theory of Evolution can be made quite clear to comparative children (I speak from personal experience). Recent discoveries have revealed to us that ancient nations must have reached an extraordinarily high state of civilisation. Six thousand years ago, in the valley of the Nile, there existed a standard of civilisation incomparably higher than that of the Jews at the time when God is alleged to have selected them as His chosen people. “The Old Testament,” says Canon C. H. Robinson, “is the history of a people insignificant in number, occupying a country about the same size as the county of Yorkshire; remarkable neither for their superior learning, civilisation, nor military power; remarkable, if for anything, for their obstinate, grasping, usurious character; who, nevertheless, were chosen out of all the nations of the ancient world to be the recipients of peculiar blessings and favours.”88 This incomprehensible selection of ignorant Jews to be the special recipients of Revelation only emphasises the contention that we have no right to assume that learned men of two thousand years ago could not have understood plain facts, or that it was necessary for them to believe in purely imaginary explanations of the cosmos, in a flat, stationary earth, in a blue-basin sky, in an “Adam and Eve” origin, in devil-possession, in absurd miracles, etc. Their ignorance, which was natural enough considering their opportunities, could easily have been dispelled when God graciously condescended to come and live among them. What a proof would that not have been of His Divinity!
In any case, we are to understand that the Apostles were inspired by the Holy Ghost, so that they might be able to work miracles and be witnesses unto Christ, even to the utmost parts of the earth. Surely, then, they could and should have been enlightened for their mission work up to the level, say, of some of our twentieth-century theologians? The miracle of an intelligence and knowledge equal to that of the average modern apologist is not, after all, so very inconceivable, and it would, at least, have been more useful than miracle-working in a miracle-believing age. Christians, who glibly admit that Jesus had only the knowledge of His age, cannot, I think, fully realise the force of such an admission. One reason for this may be that their own knowledge is not completely up to date. That Jesus had no knowledge of nature’s inviolable laws and shared many of the gross superstitions prevalent around Him; that He accepted the Scriptures as literally true, and not in the sense now attributed to them by the Higher Critics; that He believed that He would come again “in the clouds of heaven with power and great might,” and that the generation in which He lived would not pass away till this had been fulfilled—of all this they may be dimly conscious; but what remain still to be studied by them are the startling disclosures of Comparative Mythology, and of the now fully-established theory of Evolution, and their bearing upon the Christian Faith. The matter is one of the utmost importance, as will be seen by a perusal of the following chapters.