(3.) The same quality of good sense will enable the interpreter to make those limitations in the language of the sacred writers which are common in popular discourse. In the language of daily life many statements are made in general terms that require for their exact truthfulness various qualifications which the readers or hearers can readily supply for themselves. Honest men, addressing honest men, are not in the habit of guarding their words against every possible misconstruction. It is enough if they speak so that all who will can understand them.
It is said, for example (Gen. 41:57), that "all countries (literally, all the earth) came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn; because the famine was sore in all the earth." It would be only trifling to ask whether "all the earth" included the people of Europe and India. The reader naturally understands all the lands around Egypt, since they only could come thither for corn. So when it is said in the account of the deluge that "all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered" (Gen. 7:19), it is straining the sacred writer's words to give them a rigid geographical application, as if they must needs include the mountains about the North pole. "All the high hills under the whole heaven" were those where man dwelt, and which were consequently known to man. "The Holy Ghost," says John, "was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified." John 7:39. Yet David prayed ages before: "Take not thy Holy Spirit from me" (Psa. 51:11); Isaiah says of ancient Israel that "they rebelled and vexed his Holy Spirit" (Isa. 63:10); the Saviour, long before his glorification, promised the Holy Spirit to all that should ask for him (Luke 11:13); and it is a fundamental article of our faith that from Abel to the archangel's trump all holiness is the fruit of the Spirit. But John's readers, who lived after the plenary gift of the Holy Spirit from the day of Pentecost and onward, could not fail to understand him as referring to the gift of the Spirit in that special sense. The apostle Paul says (1 Tim. 2:4) that God "will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth." Yet the same apostle teaches that some will remain in ignorance of the truth, and thus perish. 2 Thess. 1: 8, 9; 2:11, 12. The reader's good sense readily reconciles the former with the latter passages. He understands God's will to have all men saved as the will of benevolent desire; just as God says of ancient Israel (Psa. 81:13). "Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways!" but because they would not do this, he "gave them up to their own heart's lust, and they walked in their own counsels" (ver. 12). Many like illustrations might be added.
(4.) Hence we readily infer the office of a sound judgment in reconciling apparent contradictions, since these arise mainly from the neglect, in one or both of the passages between which the contradiction is said to exist, of reasonable qualifications and limitations.
A striking illustration of this is found in the two accounts of the creation. Gen. chaps. 1-2:3 and chap. 2:4-25. In the former narrative the order of time is an essential element. Not so in the latter, where man is the central object, and the different parts of creation are mentioned only as the writer has occasion to speak of them in connection with him. Hence we have in this latter passage the creation of the man (ver. 7), the planting of the garden for his use with its trees and rivers (ver. 8-14), the placing of the man in the garden and the law imposed upon him (ver. 15-17), the defective condition of the man (ver. 18), the notice in connection with this of the creation of beasts and fowls and their being brought to the man to receive names (ver. 19, 20), the creation of the woman and the primitive condition of the pair (ver. 21-25). This simple statement of the course of narration sufficiently refutes the allegation that the second account is inconsistent with the first.
In the first account of Paul's conversion it is said that "the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice but seeing no man." Acts 9:7. In the second Paul says: "They that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me." Acts 22:9. There is no valid ground for doubting that the first narrative, as well as the other two, came from the lips of the apostle himself, and the assumption of any essential contradiction is unreasonable and unnecessary. In regard to the light, it is certain that Paul saw the person of the Saviour, and was made blind by the glory of the vision (Acts 9:17, 27; 22:14; 1 Cor. 9:1), while his companions saw only the light that shone around them, which did not make them blind. In regard to the voice, it is a fair interpretation that they heard a voice only, but no intelligible words. How this difference of perception between Paul and his companions in regard to both the light and the voice was effected we do not know, nor is it necessary that we should. The first account, again, represents Paul's companions as having "stood speechless," while in the third the apostle says: "When we were all fallen to the earth," Acts 26:14. The most natural explanation here is that the third narrative gives the posture with accuracy, while the first lays stress only upon the amazement which fixed them in a motionless attitude. The apparent discrepancies in these three parallel histories are peculiarly instructive, because they all proceed from the pen of the same author, and must all have been derived from the same source. Such circumstantial differences have the stamp of reality. Instead of throwing any discredit upon the transaction, they only establish its truth upon a firmer basis. Many like illustrations might be added.
(5.) Finally, where the means of reconciling discrepancies are not apparent, the same quality of a sound judgment will keep us from the two extremes of seeking, on the one hand, forced and unnatural explanations, and, on the other, of discrediting well-attested transactions on account of these discrepancies. In the scriptural narratives there are some difficulties (relating mostly to numbers, dates, and the chronological order of events) which we find ourselves unable, with our present means of knowledge, to solve in a satisfactory way. It is the part of sober reason to reserve these difficulties for further light, not to set aside, in view of them, facts attested by irrefragable proof.
Nothing in the evangelic record is more certain, for example, than the fact of our Lord's resurrection. Yet to harmonize the four accounts which we have of it in all their details is a work of extreme difficulty. "Supposing us to be acquainted with every thing said and done, in its order and exactness, we should doubtless be able to reconcile, or account for, the present forms of the narratives; but not having this key to the harmonizing of them, attempts to do so in minute particulars carry no certainty with them." Alford on Matt. 28:1-10. The same general principle applies to other difficulties—in the Old Testament, that respecting the duration of the sojourn in Egypt, and other chronological questions; in the New, that of the two genealogies given of our Lord by Matthew and Luke, that of the day when our Lord ate the passover with his disciples, etc. See further in Chaps. 19, Nos. 6 and 8; 20, No. 22; 29, Nos. 8-10.
8. In bringing this chapter to a conclusion, we add a few words on the office of reason in the interpretation of Scripture. It is admitted by all that we have certain primitive intuitions which lie at the foundation of all knowledge. That an immutable obligation, for example, rests on all men to be truthful, just, benevolent, and grateful, is a truth which we see by the direct light of conscience. There are certain moral axioms, also, outside of the direct sphere of conscience, which shine by their own light. Such is that fundamental truth of theology thus announced by the apostle John: "God is light, and in him is no darkness at all" (1 John 1:5); where light and darkness are both taken in a moral sense, as the context shows; and thus by the apostle James: "God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man" (Jas. 1:13); and thus, ages before, by Moses: "He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he" (Deut. 32:4); and still earlier by Abraham: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (Gen. 18:25). We are sure that no declaration of God's word, properly interpreted, will contradict these necessary and universal convictions. But there are many weighty truths that lie wholly above the sphere of our direct intuitions on which the infinite understanding of God is alone competent to pass an infallible judgment. Such are the following: If it be God's will to create a race of intelligent beings, what shall be the compass of their faculties, moral, intellectual, and physical? In what circumstances and relations shall he place them, to what probation shall he subject them, and what scope shall he allow to their finite freedom? If they sin, what plan shall he devise for their redemption, and by what processes shall he reveal and execute this plan? These, and many other questions involving man's highest interests, lie above the sphere of simple intuition. God alone, who looks through eternity at a glance, can fully comprehend them, for they are all constituent parts of his eternal plan. That human reason, which cannot see the whole of truth, should affect to sit in judgment upon them, and to pronounce authoritatively what God may, and what he may not do, is the height of presumption and folly.