The Christian Faith Under Modern Searchlights

by William Hallock Johnson

The Christian Faith and Biblical Criticism

We are living at a time when territory formerly deemed sacred is being traversed by hosts of forbidding aspect under the banners of natural science, of philosophy, and of the psychology and history of religion. The greatest foe of all, it has been thought by some, has arisen within the household of faith in the form of Biblical Criticism.

An eloquent American preacher, Dr. Richard S. Storrs, has said that when Luther translated the Bible into the vernacular, "the peasant's roof was lifted to a level with the stars." Into every home whose inmates could read there came, with the Bible in their own tongue, the message of divine love and redemption. With the freedom to read the Bible came also the freedom to study the Bible, to judge by its standard the doctrines and usages of the church, to compare Scripture with Scripture, and even to bring Scripture itself with its credentials before the bar of reason. Whatever the extremes into which criticism may have run in an age in which the Cartesian principle of doubt is applied to every received opinion, the rights of Biblical Criticism must be conceded as a legacy of the Reformation.

About the works of Homer, of Plato, of Dante and of Shakespeare there has gathered a mass of material in the way of commentary and discussion, but it is safe to say that in recent years the literary output in all of these departments of study taken together is small in comparison with that which centres around the Bible. The Biblical critic has helped to attract to the Bible the intellectual interest of our age, as well as to make it the storm-centre of theological controversy. He has made it a principal object of scholarly as well as devotional interest, has thrown a flood of light upon its pages from history, archæology, philology and comparative religion, and has challenged the devout Bible reader to a more intelligent, minute and painstaking examination of the fundamental documents of his faith.

The specialization of the age has assigned the Old Testament and the New Testament to different departments of study, and the problems of each must be independently investigated. It is evident, though, that the fortunes of the Old Testament and the New are closely bound up together. The same principles of criticism are likely to be applied to both, and whether we begin with naturalism or supernaturalism in the Old Testament we shall probably end with it in the New Testament. In both Testaments Babylonian influence may be traced, and the twelve apostles may follow the twelve patriarchs into the limbo of myth. If no supernatural process of redemption, in the way of history, prophecy or revelation, can be discovered in the Old Testament, it is unlikely that any will be discovered at all. The Fourth Gospel as well as the Pentateuch has been analyzed into documents, and the same great historical transposition is seen in both Testaments; Jewish monotheism is said to have begun with Amos instead of with Abraham, and Christianity in its distinctive features with Paul instead of with Jesus.

The present state of discussion in the Old Testament field indicates, to one not a specialist in this department, that positions which have been regarded as assured are not yet settled beyond question. The literary analysis is ingenious and plausible, but, as is shown in Orr's "Problem of the Old Testament," the argument is balanced. To offset the literary analysis and the rearrangement of the history in accordance with an evolutionary scheme, there are certain considerations from history, archæology, and common reason. No such analysis has been ventured in the case of modern documents that are confessedly composite, and in the case of Homer, the nearest classical parallel, there is the same uncertainty in the results.

Purely literary considerations, as Ramsay has remarked, yield before other more objective and historical data, and the literary theories are adjusted to meet the new situation.[259] The temporary popularity in the New Testament field of the Baur-Tübingen theories, based on Hegelian principles of development, and then their general abandonment, suggest the need of caution before we accept any concensus of criticism, based upon literary and philosophical grounds alone, as the last word upon the subject. Our special concern in this lecture is with the problems of the New Testament, and we may consider briefly, I. The Pauline Epistles, II. The Acts, III. The Synoptic Problem, and IV. The Johannine Problem.

I. The Pauline Epistles

It is frequently said that the figure of the Apostle Paul stands out against the background of history in bolder relief and with individual features more strongly marked than does any other character in antiquity. Not only has his public career been narrated by one who was apparently his friend and companion in labours, but he has left a large collection of letters, full of profound teaching upon religion and ethics, and abounding in autobiographic details and in intimate revelations of character.

The school of Baur recognized as genuine only the four central epistles, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians and Galatians, making in bulk about three-fifths of the writings, exclusive of Hebrews, which have been assigned to Paul. The tendency of criticism since the time of Baur has been steadily in the direction of the acceptance of other epistles as Pauline. Colossians, Philippians and I Thessalonians have now been added to the list of the generally accepted writings, and it is only the fringe of Paul's writings that can be said to be still in dispute. Of these "anti-legomena," 2 Thessalonians, Ephesians and the Pastorals, it is noticeable that two of them are rejected largely on the ground that they resemble so closely in ideas and vocabulary the admittedly Pauline letters of I Thessalonians and Colossians, while a Pauline nucleus is often acknowledged in the Pastorals by those who do not assign the epistles as a whole to Paul.