OBJECTIONS ON CRITICAL GROUNDS.

Under this head are classed sundry objections arising out of the alleged discoveries and conclusions of Modern Criticism as to the origin and authorship of certain books of the Bible, and as to their transmission to the present time.

The word Criticism has received several different significations. Primarily a critic means a judge, from krino; and one who examined anything care fully, so as to judge of its character or its meaning, was called a critic. So Criticism was used in a very wide sense, including interpretation or ex position. At present, in reference to the Bible, Criticism is commonly limited to various subsidiary topics which precede and prepare for interpretation; and in this sense it is customary to distinguish between Text Criticism and Higher Criticism. The former signifies the discussion as to the agreement of the present form of the sacred text with the originals as they proceeded from their respective authors. The latter embraces all inquiries, especially from internal evidence, as to the author ship of the writings, their age, circumstances of composition, object, etc., thus covering a consider able part of the subject of investigation usually considered in what is termed Special Introduction.

Of course it is beyond our scope here to take up all the objections that might arise in connection with Criticism in its widest application. We shall endeavor to discuss briefly those which are based on Text Criticism and Higher Criticism.

1. It is objected, that, with all the researches of Text Criticism, it is not possible in all cases to be certain what was the original text. Hence it is alleged, that, even if the original was infallible, our present text is not; that plenary inspiration, were it granted, would be useless and unmeaning, if the writings were not preserved miraculously and absolutely (as they evidently have not been) from the accidents of time and of careless copying; and that it is not probable that God would supernaturally confer complete accuracy and authority, if the documents were then to be left to the usual possibilities of error in transmission to future ages. To these objections we reply: —

a. The facts present a valid argument against the unfounded claim that was once made, that every letter, syllable, and even every vowel-point and accent of our present received copies of the Bible, must be regarded as inspired. But they do not affect our doctrine, for we make no such claim. The inspiration of the original Scriptures is what we affirm; and this is an entirely different question from the accuracy with which copies of them have been preserved. It is now well known that the Hebrew vowel-points are of later origin than the Christian era (probably about the fifth or sixth century), and can only be regarded as representing the carefully preserved, but not authoritative, tradition as to the pronunciation, while the consonants alone form the ancient text.¹ Also it is thoroughly understood that the manuscripts both of the Old and the New Testament have been subject to the defects necessarily incident to the most careful copying. What we affirm is, that the Sacred Scriptures, as they came from their respective authors, had the characteristics of accuracy and authority, as messages from God.

b. The Scriptures, though subject to the necessary perils of transcription, were specially protected, not only by a general providential guardianship, which it is fair to assume and which history con firms, but by several favoring circumstances of no small importance. Among these are — the reverence with which from the beginning they were regarded, occasioning more frequent copying than in the case of any other book in the world, and more careful and affectionate effort to be accurate; the number of manuscripts, which naturally increases the number of various readings to be noted, but also greatly increases the opportunity of detecting errors, and arriving with much confidence at the original text; the publicity of these documents by their being read repeatedly and reverently in worship, which also tended to insure the discovery and correction of errors; the numerous translations, early and late, which called attention to the minutiæ of their language and expression; the habit of delivering discourses based on them, and of making extensive quotations from them, in speaking and writing; the elaborate expositions and commentaries, the harmonies and comparisons of parallel passages, and even the searches, friendly or hostile, after discrepancies and difficulties, beginning at an early period, and kept up with unwearied perseverance and microscopic minuteness; the wide diffusion of copies in different lands, and often in the hostile custody of warring sects, prompt to detect and eager to expose any falsification or corruption. All these circumstances have tended to secure in a very high degree substantial accuracy and purity in the trans mission of copies of the sacred writings.

c. The limits of error, within which we are practically sure of our ground, may be very confidently fixed, and leave little opportunity of mistake as to the teaching of Scripture in regard to any fact, or doctrine, or precept. This is especially true of those parts of the Bible on which faith and duty chiefly rest. If there are “textual uncertainties,” as we frankly admit, there are also textual certain ties; and these are ample enough for guidance through the snares of earth and to the glories of heaven.²

On this subject the emphatic testimony of Westcott and Hort, the most recent, and certainly among the most competent of text critics, is adequate, without further discussion. They say: —

“With regard to the great bulk of the words of the New Testament, as of most other ancient writings, there is no variation or other ground of doubt, and therefore no room for textual criticism; and here therefore an editor is merely a transcriber. The same may be said with substantial truth respecting those various readings which have never been received, and in all probability never will be received, into any printed text. The proportion of words virtually accepted on all hands as raised above doubt is very great, not less, on a rough computation, than seven eighths of the whole. The remaining eighth, there fore, formed in great part by changes of order and other comparative trivialities, constitutes the whole area of criticism. If the principles followed in the present edition are sound, this area may be very greatly reduced. Recognizing to the full the duty of abstinence from peremptory decision in cases where the evidence leaves the judgment in suspense between two or more readings, we find that, setting aside differences of orthography, the words in our opinion still subject to doubt only make up about one sixtieth of the whole New Testament. In this second estimate the proportion of comparatively trivial variations is beyond measure larger than in the former; so that the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation is but a small fraction of the whole residuary variation, and can hardly form more than a thousandth part of the entire text.” — The New Testament in Greek, II. 2.

With this weighty testimony agree the well chosen words of Dr. Philip Schaff, the chairman of the American Committee of the Revisers.

“This multitude of various readings of the Greek text need not puzzle or alarm any Christian. It is the natural result of the great wealth of our documentary resources; it is a testimony to the immense importance of the New Testament; it does not affect, but it rather insures, the integrity of the text; and it is a useful stimulus to study.

“Only about 400 of the 100,000 or 150,000 variations materially affect the sense. Of these, again, not more than about fifty are really important for some reason or other; and even of these fifty not one affects an article of faith or a precept of duty which is not abundantly sustained by other and undoubted passages, or by the whole tenor of Scripture teaching. The Textus Receptus of Stephens, Beza, and Elzevir, and of our English Version, teach precisely the same Christianity as the uncial text of the Sinaitic and Vatican manuscripts, the oldest versions, and the Anglo-American Revision.” — Companion to the New Testament, p. 177.

Richard Bentley, the ablest and boldest of the earlier classical critics of England, affirmed that even the worst of manuscripts does not pervert or set aside “one article of faith or moral precept.”

Dr. Ezra Abbot, of Harvard, who ranked among the first textual critics, and was not hampered by orthodox bias (being a Unitarian), asserted that no Christian doctrine or duty rests on those portions of the text which are affected by differences in the manuscripts; still less is anything essential in Christianity touched by the various readings. They do, to be sure, affect the bearing of a few passages on the doctrine of the Trinity; but the truth or falsity of the doctrine by no means despends upon the reading of those passages.” The same scholar spoke on the subject more fully, with special reference to the English Revision: —

“This host of various readings may startle one who is not acquainted with the subject, and he may imagine that the whole text of the New Testament is thus rendered uncertain. But a careful analysis will show that nineteen twentieths of these are of no more consequence than the palpable errata in the first proof of a modern printer; they have so little authority, or are so manifestly false, that they may be at once dismissed from consideration. Of those which remain, probably nine tenths are of no importance as regards the sense; the differences either cannot be represented in a translation, or affect the form of expression merely, not the essential meaning of the sentence. Though the corrections made by the revisers in the Greek text of the New Testament followed by our translators probably exceed two thousand, hardly one tenth of them, perhaps not one twentieth, will be noticed by the ordinary reader. Of the small residue, many are indeed of sufficient interest and importance to constitute one of the strongest reasons for making a new revision, which should no longer suffer the known errors of copyists to take the place of the words of the evangelists and apostles. But the chief value of the work accomplished by the self denying scholars who have spent so much time and labor in the search for manuscripts, and in their collation or publication, does not consist, after all, in the corrections of the text which have resulted from the researches. These corrections may affect a few of the passages which have been relied on for the sup port of certain doctrines, but not to such an extent as essentially to alter the state of the argument. Still less is any question of Christian duty touched by the multitude of various readings. The greatest service which the scholars who have devoted them selves to critical studies and the collection of critical materials have rendered has been the establishment of the fact that, on the whole, the New Testament writings have come down to us in a text remarkably free from important corruptions, even in the late and inferior manuscripts on which the so — called received text ' was founded; while the helps which we now possess for restoring it to its primitive purity far exceed those which we enjoy in the case of any eminent classical author whose works have come down to us. The multitude of various readings, which to the thoughtless or ignorant seem so alarming, is simply the result of the extraordinary richness and variety of our critical resources." — Sunday School Times, May 28, 1881.

d. It is not true that plenary inspiration of the original would be useless, unless the copies were secured by a perpetual miracle against the effects of time and of careless and corrupt transmission. A truly divine original, even if copied with no more than ordinary human care and fidelity, is vastly superior to an original, however accurately pre served, that never had divine authority. And obviously the fact that it was recognized and accepted as from God would serve greatly to insure its being preserved with more than ordinary care.

e. Neither can it be justly said that there is no probability that God would supernaturally inspire the writings, unless he also miraculously preserved them from erroneous transcription. He might do the one, which he alone could do, and leave the other, as in so many other matters, to the faithful ness of his servants intrusted with that responsibility. We know that the oral teaching of our Lord Jesus not reported by our Evangelists was directly and thoroughly the voice of God. We believe that the oral and unrecorded instructions of the Apostles in their official work were inspired. Yet there is no reason to affirm any miracle of preservation for either. The voice of God in these forms was limited, except indirectly, to the audience or the generation that heard it. The accidents and corruptions of oral transmission did not render either impossible, or improbable, or unmeaning, or useless, the divine authority with which they spake. Why should the similar but smaller perils of written transmission render it incredible that God should inspire, in the fullest sense, the records of his grace?

2. The objections on critical grounds that are most urgently and confidently pressed against the doctrine of Inspiration are those arising from what is called the Higher Criticism.

This is a region of thought and inquiry almost entirely modern, in which much is still vague, and dependent largely on subjective impressions and presuppositions, rather than ascertained facts, but where positive assertion is often furnished with surprising liberality in the absence of definite in formation. The remark of Professor Ladd on this subject is eminently just, as pointing out the weak nesses of both the older and the newer Criticism.

“That the former dogmatic manner of regarding these critical questions, while it claimed to weigh carefully the purely external and historical sources for its affirmations, was in reality largely subjective in the worst sense of the word, there can be no dispute. But there ought to be just as little dispute, that much of the more modern criticism, whether it please to call itself external or internal, or neither, is just as largely subjective, in quite as bad a sense of the word. The difference between the older so-called critics and many of the more modern ones consists largely in this: the former had a childish trust in untrustworthy traditions, while the latter have a conceited confidence in the vagaries of their own minds.” — Doctrine of Sacred Scripture, I. 491.

We have no need nor disposition to undervalue either the legitimate method or the fairly established results of modern critical research. Much may be learned, much has been learned, by the patient, elaborate comparisons on which it proceeds; and a true “Higher Criticism” may be just as valuable as a false or misguided attempt at it may be dangerous and delusive.

It is impossible, of course, to give here a full discussion of many, or in fact of any, of the questions arising on this topic; our aim is only to present such general considerations as may show how far those questions apply to our present subject.

a. It is highly important to distinguish between Criticism and the critics. We are often assured vehemently that the verdict of Criticism” is thus and so; when perhaps it is only the sentiment of a few critics, possibly, when sifted, of a single man of eminence, re-echoed and repeated by several other persons. Doctors disagree, and so do critics.

b. Some critical theories of large extent and pre tension are based on cool assumptions of what is utterly devoid of proof. For instance, the views of Graf and Kuenen are avowedly based on the denial of anything really supernatural, the ignoring of any i actual miracle or prophecy. Whatever appears to be such must be either ingeniously explained away, or set aside contemptuously as unhistorical, the polite modern term for false. The Leyden school of theologians have attempted to do for the Old Testament what the Tübingen school with equal confidence proposed to do for the New, that is, to revise the history of divine manifestation with the divine omitted, like the play of Hamlet with Hamlet left out. In our judgment both have failed: their verdict is that of certain critics, but not at all that of Criticism. The presuppositions on which they are based are emphatically denied.

c. A large part of the questions discussed by the Higher Criticism, whichever way they may be decided, have nothing to do with the doctrine of Inspiration, or with the acceptance of the books concerned as a part of the sacred Word. There are a number of the Biblical books, such as Kings and Chronicles, concerning the authorship and period of which the Bible itself gives no distinct indication; and whether they are concluded to be by one author or by several, whether earlier or later, can have no decisive bearing on our investigations.

d. As to some of the critical questions most discussed, it is apparent that they bear rather on the Canon of Scripture than on the Inspiration of Scripture. It is fair to say that, if the results of careful inquiry should make it necessary to reject or surrender certain books as not a genuine part of the Word of God, it would only deprive us of those books themselves, not cast any doubt or obscurity over the value and authority of the remainder. Thus, if, as the result of candid investigation, Second Peter or Jude must be given up, if Esther or Canticles cannot be vindicated as entitled to a place in the sacred volume, the evidence for the inspiration of the other books, and their utility for every Christian man, would not be thereby in the least weakened. And the question of the extent of the Canon must always be carefully distinguished from the other question, which is the one immediately under consideration, viz. what authority belongs to the books that are recognized as inspired or canonical.

e. There are books in regard to which serious doubts are urged as to authorship, but no consequences materially affecting their inspiration would follow, if the decision should be adverse to the common opinion. Thus, if Ecclesiastes be by some later author personating Solomon, or the second part of Isaiah (chapters xl. to lxvi.) be by a later Isaiah than the well-known prophet of Hezekiah's day; or, if the letter to the Hebrews should be ad judged not to be by the Apostle Paul, it would not be necessary to relinquish the inspiration or the canonical authority of these writings. We do not accept the alleged proof against the genuineness of either of these writings according to the received view of their authorship. But if we did, it would not destroy their value or their divinity for us.

f. There are other books, however, on which an adverse decision as to authorship would have a wider range, and consequences more disastrous upon the whole system of revealed truth, as commonly understood and received. Professor Ladd does not hesitate to say, that “we should regard the Pentateuch differently, if we could consider it as coming in its present form from the speech or pen of the great inspired lawgiver, Moses” (I. 497); and “there can be no doubt, that, in the narrow and more technical sense of the word, we should pronounce the Pentateuch inspired,' as we cannot now, if we could show that it was written by Moses” (I. 576). On the other hand, he declares that “complete critical proof of the spuriousness of the Fourth Gospel would profoundly change our conception of Sacred Scripture, and would not leave untouched our conception of Christianity it self” (I. 577). He as earnestly denies that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, as he affirms that John wrote the Gospel; and frankly recognizes the logical con sequences of the decision in both cases.

The Mosaic authorship of the body of the Pentateuch (aside from the addition to Deuteronomy which records his death, and possibly a few brief notes, geographical or historical, which may have been inserted by some later hand) seems to us of profound importance. It is so thoroughly assumed and recognized elsewhere in Scripture, that to deny it leads naturally, we think, to a denial of the reality of Old Testament history, and to a subversal of the whole scheme and system of divine revelation. If the Pentateuch, as we are told by some, is “not a work, but a growth,” of exceedingly composite authorship and mainly post-exilian origin; if it is a compound of Babylonish legends and pious frauds, whether gotten up for selfish interest, or class aggrandizement, or with broader and more patriotic purpose; if it not only gives indications, as we think it does, of diverse sources traditional or documentary, employed under divine direction by Moses himself, but also contains, as we think it does not, contradictions and marks of falsehood; if Moses himself is, as some contend, a mythical personage, and the Exodus never actually occurred as described; — we can scarcely vindicate the verity of the subsequent history, or the allusions of Jesus and the Apostles to these writings.

So, if the genuineness of Daniel is successfully assailed, and it must be dragged down from the position of a true history and prophecy to be a legend of the era of the Maccabees, — a vaticinium post eventum, a fiction designed to inspire the patriotic ardor of the Jewish rebels against Antiochus Epiphanes, — we cannot, it seems to us, logically stop short with that; but must either exscind it from the Canon, in spite of its recognition by Jews and Christians and by our Lord himself, or else maintain such moral enormities as an honest lie, a fraud of divine origin.

In like manner, the authorship of the Fourth Gospel by the Apostle John seems to us not only to have been triumphantly vindicated from the ingenious and vehement assaults it has encountered, but to be vital to the system of Christianity, as a divinely inspired whole. This Gospel is, as Dr. E. H. Sears has well styled it, “the Heart of Jesus Christ.”³

1) Dr. Ladd affirms: “We may say in brief of the Masoretic text, punctuation as well as consonants, as does Wellhausen, “As a type of speech, the punctuation is for us unalterable; as a com mentary, inasmuch as it reproduces that construction of the sense of a given passage which has prevailed since the Christian era, it is, although not unchangeable, still at least incomparably the most valuable help to the understanding.' — LADD, I. 697.

2) The only two passages in the New Testament, of any consid erable length, where the genuineness of the text may be disputed, are Mark xvi. 9–20, and John vii. 53 to viii. 11. The latter, prob ably, ought to be abandoned; the former, we think, should be re tained. Scholars have ample opportunities of information on the subject in the works of Scrivener, Alford, Tregelles, Tischendorf, and Westcott and Hort. Even those slightly familiar with the topic may find enough to satisfy their doubts in the candid and accurate statenients of Schaff in his “Companion to the New Testament.” A fair but simple test would be to take some single Epistle, e. g. the Epistle to the Romans, or that to the Galatians, and ascertain the number and the importance of the various read ings found in these important documents, and the changes in the commonly received text which would be made by the general con sent of modern text critics of the highest rank. It is stated by Ganssen, that the changes made by Griesbach that affect the sense would be only as follows:—

Galatians iv. 17, for " exclude us, " read " exclude you."

Galatians iv. 26, for “mother of us all," read “mother of us."

Galatians v. 19, for “adultery, fornication,” read " fornication. "

Romans vi. 16, for “whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness," read “whether of sin or of righteousness."

Romans vii. 6, for “that being dead wherein we were held, " read “having died to that wherein we were held.”

Romans xi. 6, omit the latter half of the verse.

Romans xii. 11, for “serving the Lord," read “serving the occasion. "

Romans xvi. 5, for “the first fruits of Achaia," read “the first fruits of Asia.”

3) It is with pleasure that we refer to the able vindication of this authorship by Doctor Ladd (I. 550-572), and to the more am ple and elaborate discussions of Bishop Lightfoot and of Doctor Ezra Abbot.