The Churches and Modern Thought. Vivian Phelips
to an extent far exceeding anything the pious layman suspects. I shall omit, as being too advanced, the views of Dr. Driver, given in his “Genesis,” or of Canon Henson, as expressed in the Contemporary Review and in his book, The Value of the Bible and Other Sermons, or of Archdeacon Wilson, shown in his various interesting books and pamphlets; and will confine myself to comparatively conservative theology. I select, as representative of this type, The Divine Library of the Old Testament, by Dr. A. F. Kirkpatrick (Master of Selwyn College, Regius Professor of Hebrew in the University of Cambridge, and Canon of Ely Cathedral), and The Study of the Gospels, being a “Handbook for the Clergy,” by Dr. J. Armitage Robinson (Dean of Westminster).
In the former, which is among the books selected by the Christian Evidence Society for their Examination in March, 1907, we read: “The lectures do not attempt to deal with many of the graver questions which are being raised as to the Old Testament.” But it is just the more difficult questions, such as those examined with such destructive effect by the Higher Criticism, which specially require to be answered. Why are they neglected? The author goes on to confess that “the books were constructed out of earlier narratives; some were formed by the union of previous collections of poetry or prophecies; some betray marks of a reviser’s hand; and even books which bear the names of well-known authors in some cases contain matter which must be attributed to other writers.” Also we find the following significant admissions. Referring to the important last twenty-seven chapters of Isaiah, he accepts Dr. Driver’s criticisms, and says: “I do not see how we can resist the conclusion that these chapters were not written by Isaiah, but by an unknown prophet towards the close of the Babylonian Exile”; and he owns that “it will inevitably seem to many students of the Bible that, in assigning the prophecy to a date so near to the events which it foretells, we are detracting from its truly predictive character and diminishing its value.” However, he considers that “Isaiah is great enough to share his glory with this disciple, in whom, being dead, he yet spoke; and, paradox as it may seem, the truly prophetic character of the work gains by being referred to the time of the Exile.” By what process of reasoning he arrives at this astonishing conclusion it is exceedingly difficult to comprehend.
Further admissions by Dr. Kirkpatrick must be noticed more briefly. They are: “The first chapter of Genesis is not, as we now know, a scientifically exact account of Creation.” “The account of the Fall is, it may be, an allegory rather than a history in the strict sense of the term.” “The Deluge was not universal in the sense that the waters covered the whole surface of the entire globe.” “The Psalms, like the Proverbs, have a long literary history. They are poems by different authors, and David may be one of them.” “Modern criticism claims, and claims with justice, that the Hexateuch, like so many of the other books, is composite in its origin, and has a long literary history.” “That the Pentateuch was entirely written by Moses is merely a Jewish tradition, which passed into the Christian Church and was commonly accepted until modern times. [Yet how much hangs upon the trustworthiness of this same Jewish tradition, and how much else may not the Church have wrongfully accepted?] Some of the variations of the LXX.72 from the Hebrew text are due, no doubt, to errors and interpolations and deliberate alterations; but after all allowance has been made for these, I do not see how any candid critic can resist the conclusion that many of them represent variations existing in the Hebrew text from which the translation was made.” “It was probably at the very beginning of this period [from the Fall of Jerusalem to the end of the fifth century], towards the close of the first century a.d., that the final settlement of an authoritative text took place.... How came it that all the copies containing other readings have disappeared?… Copies differing from it [the standard text] would die out or be deliberately destroyed.” “The oldest Hebrew MS. in existence of which the date is known was written in 916 A.D.—i.e., separated by more than a thousand years from the latest of the works included in the Canon.”
Finally, the following crucial questions are offered (pp. 88–9) and left unanswered: “In what sense, it is asked, can this legislation, which is now said to be Mosaic in elemental germ and idea only, and to represent not the inspired deliverance of a supremely great individual, but the painful efforts of many generations of law-makers; these histories which have been compiled from primitive traditions, and chronicles, and annals, and what not; these books of prophecy which are not the authentic autographs of the prophets, but posthumous collections of such writings (if any) as they left behind them, eked out by the recollections of their disciples; these Proverbs and Psalms which have been handed down by tradition and altered and edited and re-edited; these histories which contain errors of date and fact, and have been, perhaps, ‘idealised’ by the reflection of the circumstances and ideas of the writer’s own times upon a distant past; these seeming narratives which may be allegories; and these would-be prophecies which may be histories; in what sense can these be said to be inspired? The problems raised are grave.” My own thoughts, and the thoughts of many like myself, are here candidly expressed. I have nothing to add, and can only echo this learned divine’s solemn words—the problems raised are grave!
Turning now to the Study of the Gospels, we learn from Dr. Robinson as follows: There is no proof that St. Matthew is the author of the first Gospel. He is unable to fix the date himself, but quotes Dr. Harnack, who says “probably 70–75,” and who also adds the important reservation, “except certain later additions.” St. Mark’s authorship, he thinks, is practically certain, and the year 65 is the probable date. “It is,” he says, “exceedingly probable that St. Peter would not write or preach, even if he could speak at all, in any language but his mother tongue, the Aramaic of Galilee, a local dialect akin to Hebrew. When he wrote or preached to Greek-speaking people, he would use Mark or some other disciple as his interpreter.” What, then, may I ask, had become of the “gifts at Pentecost”?
St. Luke is, according to Dr. Robinson, the fellow-traveller of St. Paul, and the date of his Gospel shortly after 70. Regarding St. John’s, we are informed that Dr. Harnack fixes the date between 80 and 110, and thinks that it was written by another person of the same name—John the presbyter, or elder, of Ephesus. Dr. Robinson, however, in a chapter he devotes to the subject of the fourth Gospel, attempts to show its apostolic authorship.
Dr. Robinson admits that the authorship of all four Gospels is doubtful, but thinks that, regarding the second Gospel, we may accept the second-century tradition that it was written by St. Mark, and that St. Mark was the “interpreter” of St. Peter and wrote the Gospel in Rome from information derived from that Apostle. Very good; let us accept this conclusion. We have it, then, that one of the Gospels is from the mouth of an eye-witness. This eye-witness, however, was, after all, an eye-witness of only one year (or, according to conservative criticism, three years) of Christ’s life; he was an illiterate person, and the information he imparted after thirty or forty years had to be written down by another person in another language, and there is no telling how faithful or unfaithful the translation may have been. Besides, as Dr. Robinson points out in his chapters on “The Great Sermon” and “The Non-Marcan Document,” there are very important omissions in St. Mark’s Gospel. Referring to a supposed source for the information furnished by other evangelists, but omitted by St. Mark, he says: “You may gain some general idea of the scope of this document (the Non-Marcan73) by underlining in St. Luke’s Gospel all those portions which are to be found in St. Matthew, but are not to be found in St. Mark.”
Now, what are these omissions in St. Mark? Are they trivial? Let us judge for ourselves by taking a few selections. There is no mention whatever of the story of Christ’s miraculous birth, nor of the other incidents of His childhood which are said to be in fulfilment of prophecy, and there is no mention of the great Sermon on the Mount. The story of the Resurrection is told in a few sentences, and the Ascension in one sentence. Unfortunately, too, these very sentences are admittedly interpolations, and St. Mark really ends at xvi. 8.74 So there is no account of either the Incarnation, Resurrection, or Ascension, and we are left with oral traditions, “lost” documents, and unknown copyists, as the only source from which to obtain any detailed information concerning the very groundwork of our Creed! Could anything be more unsatisfactory, more calculated to arouse suspicion of the “Christian Verities”—the
The Greek version, known as the Septuagint (LXX.), made in Egypt in the third and second centuries B.C. for the use of the numerous body of Greek-speaking Jews and proselytes in that country.
A Greek document which is supposed to have existed and then to have been entirely lost (imagine God’s Word
See art. “Gospels,” in the