Inspiration and Interpretation / Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford

by John William Burgon

Quite superfluous must it be to state that the Acts of the Apostles, under the expurgatory process which now engages our attention, will cease to be regarded as an inspired Book; and therefore must be at once disconnected from the confessedly inspired portions of Holy Scripture.—St. Paul's Epistles, you say, on the contrary, are probably inspired, and therefore are probably to be spared.... And I really think we need go no further. If your own handling of Holy Scripture,—your own method, by yourself applied,—be not a reductio ad absurdum, I know of nothing in the world which is.... Look only at that handful of mutilated pages in the hands of one who is supposed to be the impersonation of "common sense;" turn the tattered and mangled leaves over and over, which you are pleased to call the Volume of Inspiration; and get all the comfort and help out of it you can. But be not surprised to hear that you are exposing yourself to the ridicule of the sane part of Mankind,—even while haply you are acting a part which makes the Angels weep.... How much of the Bible will remain, when Science, (Physical, Moral, Historical,) has further done her work, I forbear now to inquire: but I shrewdly suspect that she will leave you very little beyond the back and the covers.

Let us not be told, (as we doubtless shall,) that the human parts of Scripture need not be ejected from the Canon because they are human: that they may be allowed to stand with the rest, although uninspired; and the like. About this, we at least are competent judges. We are now bent on discovering how much of Holy Scripture is the Word of God; and we refuse, for the moment, to regard as such, and to retain, a single passage which, being (as you say) uninspired, is simply the word of Man.

II. Let me now be permitted to lay before you a somewhat different view of the office of Inspiration. Since the illumination of Science, falsely so called, and the process of Common Sense, would seem to have resulted in the extinction of the deposit, I ask your patience while I try to shew, that common sense, informed by a somewhat loftier Theological Instinct, may give such an account of the matter as will enable us to preserve every word of the deposit entire.

You call my attention to the catalogue of the Dukes of Edom, and tell me that it required no supernatural aid to enable Moses to write it. How, may I ask, do you ascertain that fact? No specimens of the documentary evidence of the land of Seir in the days of Moses, are known now to exist on the earth's surface. You therefore know absolutely nothing whatever about the matter of which you speak so confidently.

But, that we may grapple with the question fairly, let us come down from an age concerning which neither of us knows anything beyond what the Bible teaches, to a period with which all are familiar, and to documents of which we know at least a little. It will suit your purpose far better that you should instance the two Genealogies of our Lord,—of which you also say that it is impossible to maintain that they exhibit the work of Inspiration in the same sense as when some lofty statement of Christian doctrine comes before us. Indeed, you deny that they are inspired at all. I, on my side, am willing to admit that it is quite possible,—even probable,—that the first and the third Evangelist had access to extant documents of which they respectively availed themselves, when they recorded our Lord's descent.

But, do you not perceive that the great underlying fallacy in all you have been saying, is your own wholly gratuitous assumption that you are a competent judge of what did,—what did not,—require supernatural aid to deliver? that whatever seems as if it might have been written without Inspiration, was therefore written without it?—I see so many practical inconveniences, or rather I see such glaring absurdity, resulting from the supposition that Inspiration goes and comes before an authentic document, that I am constrained to think that you are altogether mistaken in the office which you assign to Inspiration,—in the kind of notion which you seem to entertain concerning its nature.

An Evangelist, if you please, is inspired. It becomes necessary to introduce a genealogy. Following the Divine guidance, (the nature of which, neither you nor I know anything at all about,) he applies in a certain quarter, and obtains access to a certain document. Or he repairs to a well-known repository of public archives, and out of the whole collection he is guided to make choice of one particular writing. He proceeds to transcribe it,—omitting names (dropping three generations for instance,)—or inserting names (the second Cainan for example,)—or, if you please, neither omitting nor inserting anything. The document, (suppose,) requires no correction whatever.—Well but, this man was inspired a moment ago, in what he was writing; and no reason has been shewn why he should not be inspired still. He has adopted a document, by incorporating it into his narrative. By transcribing it, he has made it his own. I am at a loss to see that its claim to be an inspired writing, from that moment forward, is in any respect inferior to the rest of the narrative in which it stands.

You are requested to remember that when we call the Bible an inspired book, we mean nothing more than that the words of it are the very utterance of the Holy Spirit;—that the Book is as much the Word of God as if high Heaven were open, and we heard God speaking to us with human voice. All I am contending for now, is, that this is at least as true of one part of the Gospel as of another: that if it be true of anything in the Gospel, it is at least as true of the Genealogy of Christ. The subject-matter indeed is different; but it is a mere confusion of thought to infer therefrom a different degree of Inspiration. Let me try and make this plainer by a few familiar illustrations.

1. When the Sovereign reads a speech from the Throne, does she speak the words of it in any different sense from the words of a speech which she has herself composed?—Nay, are words of investiture, mere words of form and state, in any less degree spoken, than words of confidence, and private friendship?

2. Again. The substance of paper and the substance of gold, are widely different. And yet, when paper has been subjected to a certain process, and stamped with a certain impress, there is practically no difference whatever between the value of what was, a moment ago, absolutely worthless, and an ingot of the purest gold.