Defense of the Faith and the Saints (Volume 2 of 2)

by B. H. Roberts

Of your nonsense of one being three, and three being but one, we will say nothing, except to remark that you must reform your arithmetic, if you expect sensible people to pay attention to your doctrines.

One other item in which we offend these reverend gentlemen is that we believe Jesus had a Father as well as a mother. Now, gentlemen, honestly, is it any worse for him to have had a Father than it is for him to have had a mother? You concede that he had a mother; that his body grew as yours did, in the womb of his mother; that he came forth of the womb by birth pains; that he suckled at the breast of woman; that through the months and years of infant weakness he was watched and guided by the hand of a loving mother. Tell me, is it true, that in your philosophy of things it is all right for Jesus to have a mother, but a terrible sin and blasphemy to think of him as having a father? Is not fatherhood as sacred and holy as motherhood? Listen, people, there is something else. Having objected to our idea of Jesus having a father, these peculiarly pious gentlemen turn now and object to our faith because we believe that we have for our spirits a heavenly mother as well as a heavenly father! They quote, in part, that splendid hymn of ours on heavenly motherhood, the great throbbing hunger of woman's soul, and which was given to this world through the inspired mind of Eliza R. Snow; the hymn is known to us as "O My Father."

In the Scripture we read: "We have had fathers of the flesh, and we did give them reverence, shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits and live?" So that we know we have had a father to our spirits; but because we hold that the spirits of men have also a mother in heaven, as well as a father, behold these reviewers complain against us. Now, observe the peculiar position of these critics: It is all right for Jesus to have a mother; but it is all wrong for him to have a father. On the other hand, it is all right for men's spirits to have a Father in heaven, but our reviewers object to our doctrine of their also having a mother there. I sometimes wonder what in the world is the matter with you, gentlemen. I am puzzled to classify your views, or the kind of beings with which you people heaven. One of your own number, however, has thrown some light upon that subject, and has so classified you—saving me the trouble—as to enable us to understand to some extent your peculiar views. I have a book here that I am going to use in this controversy. It is a new one. I got it three days ago, and have read it nearly through in order to be prepared for this occasion. It is the work of Rev. R. J. Campbell, of City Temple, London, and it is a treatise on the New Theology, just now much talked of in Europe. He describes ministers of the gospel and gives them the classification referred to a moment since, and which I think must needs be all right, since it comes from a minister. He takes the average business man of England, naming him "John Smith," for convenience, and he says this about John:

"John Smith, with whom we used to go to school, and who has since developed into a stolid British man of business, with few ideas and a tendency toward conservatism—John is a stalwart, honest, commonplace kind of person, of whom brilliant things were never prophesied and who has never been guilty of any. His wife and children go to church on Sundays. John seldom goes himself, because it bores him, but he likes to know that religion is being attended to, and he does not want to hear that his clergyman is attempting any daring flights. He has a good-natured contempt for clergymen in general, because he feels somewhat that, like women, they have to be treated with half-fictitious reverence, but that they do not count for much in the ordinary affairs of life, they are a sort of a third sex."

Now, ladies, I ask you to remember, in passing, that I am reading the words of somebody else; their are not my words. The phrase "half-fictitious reverence" is not mine. I think we ought to have real reverence for women; no fictitious reverence at all.

The ministers are here in this passage described as "a sort of third sex," and I am inclined to think that is right; for when a man in one case objects to a person having a father, and in another case considers it altogether unholy for persons to have a mother, I do not know how else to classify him but as "a sort of third sex"-kind of a man.

There seems to be objection in the review to the idea of the marriage relation existing in heaven and subsisting between divine beings. Loud complaint is made, if you hold that the intelligences of heaven obey the law of marriage. Let me ask you, Christian gentlemen, Who instituted marriage? You will answer, God. Is it holy or unholy? Did God institute an unholy thing and command men to engage in it? You will have to say that marriage is holy, since God instituted it. Very good. Then if it is holy, how do you make it out that it will be unholy for divine personages to practice it? Is it not just as good for divine personages as for you imperfect men? Can it be that your ideas of the relationship of the sexes are so impure that you must needs regard that association as so unholy as to be unworthy of divine beings? Let me read to you what a great English author—Jeremy Taylor—says on this subject of, marriage:

"Marriage is the mother of the world and preserves kingdoms, and fills cities and churches, and heaven itself. Like the useful bee, it builds a house and gathers sweetness from every flower, and labors and unites into societies and republics, and sends out colonies, and feeds the world with delicacies, and obeys and keeps order, and exercises many virtues and promotes the interest of mankind, and is that state of good to which God hath designed the present constitution of the world."

Now, you prate to us about our belief, or the belief of some of us at least, that divine personages are in this holy relationship. But tell me what it is that has been the great civilizing force of this and all other ages? What is it that best tempers man, and fits him for the society of his fellows and for holy communion with God? There is no force within the experience of man, that is so beneficial or ennobling to him as the love and devotion of a pure, good woman; and for woman there is nothing that is so sanctifying as the love of an upright, honorable man, whose arm protects her and whose love shields her from the evils of the world. These relations, blessed with the pledges of their affection in off-spring, complete the circle of man's happiness, and greatness, and exaltation of spirit in this world. It is the civilizing force that stands pre-eminent above all others. And that which sanctifies man here in this world may be trusted not to degrade him in the eternities that are to come, but, on the contrary, will contribute to his exaltation and his eternal glory. That is our faith, at least, and we would not change it for all the sexless, hermaphrodite existences that your warped minds paint in such glowing colors.

We offend again in our doctrine that men are of the same race with the divine personages we call Gods. Great stress is laid upon the idea that we believe that "as man is, God once was, and as God now is, man may become." The world usually shouts "blasphemy" and "sacrilege" at one when he talks of such a possibility. But the world moves, I am happy to say. Just now, in England, especially, there is a thought-revolution under way. Some have declared that in importance and extent it is as great as was the revolution of the sixteenth century, led by Martin Luther. The present recognized leader of this movement is the Rev. R. J. Campbell, of the City Temple, London, whose book I referred to a moment ago. This "New Theology," so-called, has the outspoken support of the Christian Commonwealth, of London, a publication of wide influence. A "Society for the Encouragement of Progressive Religious Thought" has been organized to champion the ideas of the "New Theology." Mr. Campbell numbers among his champions Dr. John Clifford, the leading figure in the English Baptist church, also Dr. R. F. Horton, chairman of the London Congregational Union. In America, his sympathizers and opponents seem to be equally numerous. Mr. W. T. Stead, of the Review of Reviews, compares the present theological ardor in London with that which marked Alexandria in the days of Athanasius, "when fishmongers at their stalls discussed the doctrine of the trinity." The strife of tongues has reached even to Germany, where Prof. Harnack, the eminent theologian, interprets it as a proof that the "formal theology of the creeds [your creeds, gentlemen,] is being gradually displaced by the vital theology of experience."