We shall probably not be wrong in classing with these writers the eminent scholar Dr. H. J. Holtzmann of Strassburg. It is indeed characteristic of Dr. Holtzmann’s method to avoid anything like dogmatic assertion of his own opinion, to work in with subtle skill a kaleidoscopic presentation of the opinions of others, while himself remaining in the background. He does indeed leave room for a rather larger amount of authentic tradition in the Gospel than the other writers mentioned. Still, in the main his position is sceptical, both as to the Asian tradition of St. John, and as to the historical character of the Gospel.
It may be observed in passing that Dr. H. J. Holtzmann of Strassburg should be carefully distinguished from his younger cousin Oscar Holtzmann, who is now Professor at Giessen. Dr. Oscar Holtzmann published a monograph on the Fourth Gospel in 1887, and he has since brought out a Life of Christ which has lately been translated into English. The two cousins occupy much the same general position; the younger has not the distinction of the elder, but he compensates to some extent by greater clearness and definiteness in the expression of his views.
Another of the older writers, Dr. O. Pfleiderer, is even more thorough-going as an allegorist. For him the Gospel is from first to last a didactic work in the guise of history; it is a ‘transparent allegory of religious and dogmatic ideas[[14]].’ He would place the first draft of the Gospel about the year 135, the last chapter and the First Epistle about 150[[15]]. But I have long thought that this attractive writer, though interesting and instructive as a historian of thought, is a ‘negligible quantity’ in the field of criticism proper.
The other four German writers whom I have mentioned all belong to the younger generation. Dr. Schmiedel (who though a Swiss Professor is, I believe, German by birth) is the eldest, and he is not yet quite fifty-three: Jülicher, the next on the list, is forty-seven. And as they belong to the younger generation, so also they may be said to mark the rise of a new School, or new method of treatment, in German Theology. The Germany for which they speak is not the dreaming, wistful, ineffective, romantic Germany of the past, but the practical, forceful, energetic and assertive Germany of the present. All, as I have said, are able writers; and the type of their ability has much in common, though they have also their little individual differences. They have all a marked directness and lucidity of style. What they think they say, without hesitation and without reserve; no one can ever be in any doubt as to their meaning. They are all apt to be somewhat contemptuous, not only of divergent views, but of a type of mind that differs from their own. Of the four, Jülicher and especially Wernle have the warmer temperament; Schmiedel and Wrede are cold and severe. Wrede writes like a mathematician, who puts Q. E. D. at the end of each step in the argument—though it would be a misfortune if the demonstration were taken to be as complete as he thinks it. Schmiedel is rather the lawyer who pursues his adversary from point to point with relentless acumen: if we could grant the major premises of his argument, there would be much to admire in his handling of the minor; but the major premises, as I think I shall show, are often at fault. Jülicher is just the downright capable person, who sees vividly what he sees and is intolerant of that which does not appeal to him. Wernle alternately attracts and repels; he attracts by his real enthusiasm for that with which he sympathizes, by his skill in presentation, and his careful observance of perspective and proportion; he repels by aggressiveness and self-confidence.
The two French writers also have something in common, though they belong to different communions. We are not surprised to find that both have an easy grace of style, to which we might in both cases also give the epithet ‘airy,’ because both are fond of speaking in generalities which are not always in the closest contact with facts; both are thorough-going allegorists, and regard the whole Gospel as a pure product of ideas and not literal history. In spite of their difference of communion, M. Loisy is on the critical side of his mind as essentially rationalist as his Protestant confrère, though he brings back, by an act of faith which some of us would call a tour de force, in the region of dogmatics what he had taken away in the field of criticism.
It seems to me that there is one word that requires to be said, though I am anxious not to have my motive misunderstood in saying it. I do not wish to do so in the least ad invidiam. Controversy is, I hope, no longer conducted in that manner. I speak simply of an objective fact which has too important a bearing on the whole question to be ignored.
When I read an argument by Professor Schürer, and try to reply to it, I am conscious that we are arguing (so to speak) in the same plane. I feel that the attitude of my opponent to the evidence is substantially the same as my own. Whatever the presuppositions may be deep down in his mind, he at any rate keeps them in abeyance. No doubt we differ widely enough as to detail; but in principle I should credit my opponent with an attitude that is really judicial, that tries to keep dogmatic considerations, or questions of ultimate belief as much in suspense as possible, and to weigh the arguments for and against in equal scales. But when I pass over to the younger theologians, I no longer feel that this is so; we seem to be arguing, not in the same, but in different planes. There is a far-reaching presupposition not merely far back but near the front of their minds. I cannot regard them as fellow seekers in the sense that we are both doing our best to ascertain how far the events of the Gospel history really transcended common experience. I take it that on this point their minds are made up before they begin to put pen to paper.
They all start with the ‘reduced’ conception of Christianity current in so many quarters, that is akin to the ancient Ebionism or Arianism. But so far as they do this their verdict as to the Fourth Gospel is determined for them beforehand. The position is stated with great frankness by Mr. Conybeare:
‘It may indeed be said that if Athanasius had not had the Fourth Gospel to draw texts from, Arius would never have been confuted. Had the fathers of the third, fourth, and fifth centuries not known this Gospel, or not embraced it as authentic, the Church would have remained semi-Ebionite, and the councils of Nice and Ephesus would never have taken place[[16]].’
This does not indeed quite correspond to the facts. To make it do so, we should have to blot out St. Paul, and other parts of the New Testament, as well as St. John. But just so far as the reasoning holds good, it is obvious that we may invert it. If a writer starts with a conception of Christianity that is ‘semi-Ebionite’ or ‘semi-Arian,’ he is bound at all costs to rule out the Fourth Gospel, not only as a dogmatic authority, but as a record of historical fact.