Is The Bible Inspired ? - James H. Brookes

NO argument is needed to prove the inspiration of the words that were spoken by our Lord Jesus Christ. Even the higher criticism will certainly admit that here at least the theory of inspired thoughts, leaving the language to the chances of human ignorance or mistake, falls very far short of the truth. It will be conceded by all who have any right to be called Christians, that both the thoughts and the words of the Saviour were absolutely free from the slightest error or imperfection. He himself declares, ” The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life,” leading Peter to respond for all the apostles, ” Thou hast the words of eternal life,” (John vi. 68-68). It is not suprising, therefore, to find Him placing the stamp of immortality upon these marvellous words, when He said, ” Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away,” (Matt, xxiv. 35).

It may be well to glance at His testimony to the unspeakable importance and priceless value of the very words that fell from his lips, for it will be seen that He attaches the same divine authority and weighty import to the words spoken and written by those whom He sent into the world as His ambassadors. Scattered through the gospels are statements like the following: “Whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock,” (Matt. vii. 24). ” Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Verily I say unto you. It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city,” (Matt. x. 14, 15). “He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him at the last day,” (John xii. 48). “He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me: and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me,” (John xiii. 20). “He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me,” (John xiv. 24). *^If they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also,” (John XV. 20). “I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me . . . Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word,” (John xvii. 8, 20).

But still more explicitly He promised them on three different occasions an inspiration, which beyond all question extended to the words they were to utter. Thus at their first commission to preach to none but the lost sheep of the house of Israel, He said to them, “When they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak; for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you,” (Matt. x. 19, 20). At another time in connection with the duty of confessing His name, He said, “When they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates, and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say: for the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say,” (Luke xii. 11, 12). Still later, in His farewell discourse that looks on to the evils of the last days, He repeated the charge and promise, “When they shall lead you, and deliver you up, take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak neither do ye premeditate; but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost,” (Mark xiii. 11).

If these assurances do not guarantee verbal inspiration to the apostles, at least for the purpose of defence against their adversaries, the doctrine can not be taught in human language. It will be observed that three times our Lord forbids them to think beforehand how or what they were to speak, to premeditate, to feel the slightest concern about the best way to answer their accusers, because they would be no more responsible for their words than children repeating the lesson they have heard from the master, because the Holy Ghost would teach them what to say and how to say. Of course it would be a ridiculous perversion of these remarkable promises, if a minister of Christ, or other witness for Him, were to plead them as an excuse for indifference, or indolence, or neglect of preparation to speak in His name; but it would have been gross disobedience and unbelief, had the apostles thought beforehand for a single moment of the speech they were to deliver to their enemies, or of the best method of presenting their cause.

They were often arrainged at the bar of Jewish and Gentile rulers, when the thrice-repeated instruction of their Lord would be recalled as a solace to their fainting hearts; and never did they more require its comfort and encouragement than on the day of Pentecost, in the presence of a scoffing mob. Accordingly we are told that, ” they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another. Behold, are not all these that speak Gallilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born? Parthians and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Lybia about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and Proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God,” (Acts ii. 4-11).

Surely in this instance there can be no dispute concerning the fact of verbal inspiration. Even if the nonsensical notion were true that the apostles spoke in their native tongue, and that their words were translated in passing from their lips into the various languages of every nation under heaven, still there could be no getting rid of verbal inspiration. If a number of illiterate American fishermen were heard speaking intelligibly and accurately in all the dialects of Europe and Asia, or if their English words were instantly conveyed to the assembled representatives of these countries in the different languages with which they were familiar, in either case there would be a mighty miracle, a plain interposition of God’s hand, a manifest control of the very words by divine power. But when we remember that the day of Pentecost was the beginning of the present dispensation of the Spirit, and that it was obviously designed to symbolize the grand purpose and wide range of the dispensation, it is a truth of no small significance that the Church age was ushered in by men, who spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. Whether they afterwards spoke and wrote in the same way or not, none can deny that the coming of God’s grace to the world rested at first upon the truth of verbal inspiration.

In what degree the Epistles are inspired is to be determined, in the first place, by the Saviour’s promise of infallible guidance to their writers. In their official utterances they were to be His mouthpiece and representatives, and in their communications to Jew or Gentile He linked His divine authority to their words in indissoluble union. “He that receiveth you, receiveth me; and he that receiveth me, receiveth him that sent me,” (Matt. x. 40). “He that heareth you, heareth me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me,” (Luke x. 16). “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them mto the world,” (John xvii. 18). “As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said this he breathed on them, and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained,” (John xx. 21-23).

Still more explicitly He said to them, “The Comforter, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you,” (John xiv. 26). “When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of trujth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me: and ye also shall bear witness because ye have been with me from the beginning,” (John xv. 26, 27). ” When he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come. He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you,” (John xv. 13, 14).

Keeping these promises in view, we are prepared in the second place to notice the testimony of the apostles themselves concerning the nature and extent of the inspiration that attaches to their writings. ” Now we have received not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual [or rather, combining the Spirit’s thoughts with the Spirit’s words]. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth [margin, discerneth] all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But w^e have the mind of Christ,” (1 Cor. ii. 12-16). If this does not assert the truth of verbal inspiration, it is difficult to imagine how it can be expressed. Not only does the apostle declare that he has the Spirit of God, and the mind of Christ, but that the language he used was in the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth.

Accordingly we find one who speaks of himself as “the least of the apostles,” (1 Cor. xv. 9), and still later, as “less than the least of all saints,” (Eph. iii. 8), and later still, as the chief of sinners, (1 Tim. i. 15), exalting his word to a level with the word of the divine Redeemer. ” Unto the married.1 command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband.” That is, the Lord Jesus Himself had given a positive command to this effect. ” But to the rest speak I, not the Lord.” That is, the Lord had said nothing about the question now presented, but the apostle says something, and his decision is no less binding than if it had been spoken by the Lord. Nay, he repeals and abolishes the Old Testament law with regard to separation between husband and wife, and therefore he claims for his words, the highest possible degree of authority and inspiration. “Now concerning virgins,” he adds, “I have no commandment of the Lord; yet I give my judgment, as one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful.” That is, the Lord had given no commandment concerning them, but the mercy that enabled him to be faithful as an apostle in speaking according to the mind of the Spirit, led him to pronounce a judgment, which must be accepted as if coming from the throne of the Almighty, (1 Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25).

It is impossible, therefore, that the same apostle could cast doubt upon his inspiration in the last / verse of the same chapter where he says, “I think also that I have the Spirit of God,” or as the Revised Version better renders it, “I think that I also have the Spirit of God,” or as the Emphatic Diaglott translates it upon the authority of the Vatican manuscript, ” I am certain that even I have the Spirit of God.” But let the reading of our common version stand as it is, audit still furnishes the strongest testimony to the inspiration of Paul’s words. Other teachers had visited the Corinthians, claiming to speak by the Spirit of God, and with a telling allusion to these he writes, I think that I also have the Spirit of God. It is as if one, perfectly familiar with a subject, should say in the face of those who cavilled at his proficiency, or boasted of their attainments, I think that I also know something of the matter in hand. He would not by this language concede his ignorance, but rather positively assert his superiority. Hence the apostle follows up his testimony with the solemn charge, “If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things which I write unto you, are the commandments of the Lord,” (1 Cor. xiv. 37). Thus does this humble man, when he writes as an apostle, link his words with the words of the ascended Saviour, and require an acknowledgement of their divine origin and sovereignty.

In the same chapter he says, “I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than ye all,” and these tongues were not acquired by human learning, but imparted by the Holy Spirit. Again he says, “since ye seek a proof of Christ speaking in me, which to you-ward is not weak, but is mighty in you,” (2 Cor. xiii. 3). It is not Christ inspiring his thoughts, but Christ speaking in him by the Holy Spirit, according to His promise. Again he says, “I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ,” (Gal. i. 11, 12). Again he says, “by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ); which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit,” (Eph. iii. 3-5). “For this cause also, thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of man, but, as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe,” (1 Thess. ii. 13). ” He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given unto us his Holy Spirit,” (1 Thess. iv. 8). ” Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions [instructions, injunctions delivered], which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle,” (2 Thess. ii. 15). ” Hold fast the form [the pattern, or exact type, or concise representation] of sound words, which thou hast heard of me,” (2 Tim. i. 13). Surely the plenary and verbal inspiration of the apostle’s writings could not be asserted in stronger terms.

It may be well to follow Paul’s distinct and repeated claim for the inspiration of his epistles with the testimony of another apostle. “Even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest^ as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction,” (2 Peter iii. 15-16). Here it will be observed, Peter places all of Paul’s epistles on precisely the same high plane of divine authority held by the other Scriptures, which, as abundantly proved, both by the Old and New Testament, were inspired in their very words, and in the minutest inflection of their words.

But Peter also takes his stand by the side of Paul, when he says in the same chapter, “that ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour,” (2 Peter iii. 2). He charges the scattered flock of God to be mindful of the words, not of the thoughts, but of the words spoken and written by all in former times who had revealed the will of Jehovah, and then immediately puts his commandment, and the commandment or words of the other apostles, on an equality with the authoritative declarations of inspired prophets. The reason for this remarkable demand upon the faith and obedience of Christians he gives in his first epistle, where he shows that it was the Spirit of Christ moving the Old Testament prophets, ” unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us did they minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the Gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven,” (1 Peter i. 12).

Here, too. New Testament apostles are classed with Old Testament prophets, of whom the same writer declares that they “spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” Hence another apostle says, “Beloved, remember ye the words, [the very words, mark], which were spoken before of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; how that they told you there should be mockers in the last times, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts,” (Jude 17, 18). Still another apostle tells us that “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father o lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures . . . . Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves,” (Jas. i. 17-22).

Thus do all of the apostles claim for the words of the Bible, including their own words, the inspiration and authority of God, and this ought to be sufficient with every true Christian to settle the question against all the theories and objections of the higher criticism or any other kind of criticism. The last of the apostles, at the very close of the Sacred Scriptures, says of a book so full of symbolical language few perhaps really study it, and fewer still pretend to understand it, ” I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book. If any man shall add unto them, God^ shall add unto him the plagues which are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life, and out of the holy city, which are written in this book,” (Rev. xxii. 18, 19, Revised Version). This is the final utterance of inspiration and of revelation except the sweet promise and benediction, “He which testifieth these things saith. Surely I come quickly; Amen. Even so, come. Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with the saints. Amen.”

The first man who was employed by the Holy Ghost as His amanuensis said, ” Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it,” (Deut, iv. 2), and the last man employed by the same Spirit, nearly sixteen hundred years later, distinctly testifies unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, “If any man shall add unto them, God shall add unto him the plagues which are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life.” Truly a terrible warning we have here, which it would be well for all to heed, and it will be observed that the warning refers, not to the thoughts, but to the words of scripture, beginning with the Pentateuch and ending with the Apocalypse.

Of course the threat of punishment against those who trifle with the words of the Revelation applies to every part of the Bible, the whole of which, it has been abundantly proved, is given by inspiration of God; and hence the believer reads with surprise and sadness statements like the following, scattered through a book recently sent forth by a Professor in a Theological Seminary: “Are the laws of the Pentateuch any less divine, if it should be proved that they are the product of the experience of God’s people from Moses to Josiah?” (Biblical Study, p. 25). ” We have found that the results of the textual criticism are in conflict with verbal inspiration,” (p. 172). Astruc, a Roman Catholic physician, in 1753, “presented to the learned world, with some hesitation and timidity, his discovery that the use of the divine names, Elohim and Jehovah, divided the book of Genesis into two great memoirs and nine lesser ones. This was a real discovery, which, after a hundred years of debate, has at last won the consent of the vast majority of biblical scholars,” (p. 202). “Fiction is represented in the New Testament in the parables of Jesus. It is also represented in the apocryphal books of Tobit and Susanna, and in the 4th book of Maccabees in the story about the seven heroic Maccabee sons, and, in Esdras iv., in the legend about Zerubbabel and Truth,” (p. 238). “Higher criticism comes into conflict with the authority of Scripture when it finds that its statements are not authoritative and its revelations are not credible,” (p. 243). “There are also a few examples in the New Testament of the use of legends and fables, (2 Pet. ii. 4, seq; Jude 9, seq; 2 Tim. iii. 8), for purposes of illustration, which do not commit the authors to their historical truthfulness,” (p. 316).

There is much more of the same sort, but enough has been quoted to bring grief to all who love the word of God, and to show that the influence of such a book with young men preparing for the ministry, like the imagination of the thoughts of the human heart, must be “only evil continually.” The author asks, “Are the laws of the Pentateuch any less divine, if it should be proved that they are the product of the experience of God’s people from Moses to Josiah?” Undoubtedly they are; and not only less divine, but unworthy of the least respect, for such a theory makes Moses, or the writer of the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, and Christ Himself, and the apostles, false witnesses, because they again and again testify that it was the hand of Moses that wrote the Pentateuch, and that it was delivered to Israel before the Jordan was crossed.

Again he coolly states that “the results of the textual criticism are in conflict with verbal inspiration; “but in whose opinion? Not certainly in the opinion of Prof. Charles Hodge, beyond all comparison the greatest theologian this country has ever produced, who says, ” The inspiration of the Scriptures extends to the words. 1. This again is included in the infallibility which our Lord ascribes to the Scriptures. A mere human report or record of a divine revelation must of necessity be not only fallible, but more or less erroneous. 2. The’ thoughts are in the words. The two are inseparable. If the words, priest, sacrifice, ransom, expiation, propitiation, purification by blood, and the like, have no divine authority, then the doctrine which they embody has no authority. 3. Christ and His apostles argue from the very words of Scripture . . . . Constantly it is the very words of Scripture which are quoted as of divine authority. 4. The very form in which the doctrine of inspiration is taught in the Bible, assumes that the organs of God in the communication of His will were controlled by Him in the words which they used . . . This, moreover, is the very idea of inspiration as understood by the ancient world. The words of the oracle were assumed to be the words of the divinity, and not those selected by the organ of communication,” (Systematic Theology, Vol. I p. 164).

The opinion so confidently expressed by the author of Biblical Study is certainly not that of Professors A. A. Hodge and B. B. Warfield, who are not surpassed by him in scholarship and sound judgment, and who say that “the divine superintendence, which we call inspiration, extended to the verbal expression of the thoughts of the sacred writers, as well as to the thoughts themselves, and hence the Bible considered as a record, an utterance in words of a divine revelation, is the word of God to us . . . . The line (of inspired or not inspired, of infallible or fallible) can never rationally he drawn between the thoughts and the words of Scripture,” (Presbyterian Review). Again the latter of these able Professors says in a published statement of his views, “That we have an inspired Bible and a verbally inspired one, we have the witness of God Himself; and that this means that every statement of whatever kind in the whole compass of Scripture, from the first word of Genesis to the last of Revelation, is infallibly true and of absolute authority to bind the head, heart, and life, rests on no lower authority . . . . May the man who through indifference, carelessness, conceit, or wickedness would deny this truth of God and teach men so — no, not perish — but be converted from the error of his way, and, like a second Paul, be set by God^s power to defend that which he would have destroyed.”

The statement that the results of textual criticism are in conflict with verbal inspiration, is certainly not the opinion of Dr. Alexander Carson, pronounced by Dr. Edgar in the Orthodox Presbyterian of Belfast, “the Jonathan Edwards of the nineteenth century,” who says to those who were in sympathy with the views expressed by the author of Biblical Study, ” How can we know the thoughts of an author except by the words of the author? Had the inspired writers been left to themselves as to the choice of words in any part of their writings, they might have made a bad choice, and inadequately or erroneously represented the mind of the Spirit. The best writer that ever moved a quill may often fail in expressing his own sentiments . . . . Will you show us how any piece of composition can be ascribed to an author, when the words, sentences and collocation are not his own? Are the words, sentences and arrangement, no parts of the writings to which they belong? I am one of those fantastic people who believe that a writing contains all the words, sentences and arrangement, that are found in it; and therefore can not see how all Scripture is given by inspiration, if any word originally in the Scripture was uninspired. I am so old fashioned as to believe, that if all Scripture is inspired, there is no Scripture which is uninspired, for I have not yet learned to believe both sides of a contradiction,” (Inspiration of the Scriptures, p. 104).

It is certainly not the opinion of the first of living preachers, C. H. Spurgeon, who says in his preface to the fifth volume of The Treasury of David, ” We can not but express our sense of the superficiality of the best and most laborious of comments, when compared with the bottomless depths of the Sacred Word, nor can we refrain from uttering our growing conviction that the Scriptures possess a verbal as well as a plenary inspiration; indeed, we are quite unable to see how they could have the one without the other. So much of meaning dwells in the turn of an expression, the tense of a verb, or the number of a noun, that we believe in the inspiration of the words themselves; certainly the words are the things written — for the refined spirit of a passage is not the creature of pen and ink. Our Lord’s favorite sentence, ‘It is written,’ must of necessity apply to words, for only words are written.”

Human authority is of little worth touching a question definitely settled by the word of God, but since so many, alas! consider it of importance, it may not be amiss to cite two or three other witnesses to the truth of verbal inspiration. Rev. J. R. Graves, LL. D., the bravest and strongest man, as the world would say, in the Southern Baptist Church, asks the question, “Are all parts of the Bible inspired? Is its inspiration plenary only, or plenary verbal? . . . Since no distinction is made in the amount of inspiration of any part, we are not at liberty to intimate a difference. Each part is therefore equally inspired with any other part. If the whole is God’s word, each and every portion and part of it, every paragraph and period, every sentiment and sentence and word is equally God’s word . . . . There may be errors in the transcription of the ancient manuscripts; there may be errors in translation, and errors many in interpretation, but that the original Scriptures are the words of the living God, He most explicitly declares them to be. No true friend to Christianity can advocate a spotted inspiration, since it effectually wipes out the Bible as a reliable book from the face of the earth.”

Robert Haldane, previously quoted, well says, “Nothing can be more clearly, more expressly, or more precisely taught in the Word of God. And while other important doctrines may be met with passages of seeming opposition, there is not in the language of the Scriptures one expression that even appears to contradict their plenary and verbal inspiration. Whence, then, it may be asked, has arisen the idea of difficulty so general among the learned, but utterly unknown to the great body of Christians? It has wholly arisen from a profane desire to penetrate into the manner of the Divine operation on the mind of man in the communication of revealed truth . . . . Every thing contained in the Bible, whether the words of the penman, that contain the mind of God, or the words of others, that are inserted for the purpose of giving such information as He is pleased to impart, is equally, according to the express declarations of Scripture, dictated by God. It should, however, be observed, that it is not at all implied in the assertion of plenary verbal inspiration, that every example recorded in Scripture, without any judgment expressed with regard to the conduct of good, or even inspired men, should be for imitation. When the word of God records human conduct, without pronouncing on its morality, whether it is sin or duty must be ascertained by an appeal to the general principles of Scripture.”

Dr. Anderson, one of the clearest and most scholarly of recent English writers, tells us “it is also most important to recognize the fact that all Scripture is equally inspired. We are not at liberty to exercise a verifying faculty, and to accept or reject what we please, or just that truth or statement that commends itself to our consciousness, and adjusts itself to our capacity of belief. The writers were not left to their own judgment as to what particular event or narrative was to be inserted in the Scriptures, any more than as to how the record thereof was to be worded. So that whether it be a statement of the most prosaic character, or a prediction of the loftiest sublimity, a maxim of simple ethics, or a doctrine of the deepest interest and importance, all is inspired, all is of God. The tables of genealogy, the dimensions of the Tabernacles, the prophecies of Messiah’s future triumph and glorious reign — all are equally inspired, and all are from God. And not only is this Divine inspiration plenary, but it is verbal also; for the words themselves, which record the facts, describe the narratives, and enunciate the truths, are all and equally inspired. That is to say, that the words of inspired Scripture are the words of the Lord God Himself, that the men who were inspired by the Spirit of God to write the Scriptures were not left to choose their own words promiscuously, but that whilst the individuality of each writer was preserved, the words themselves, with their various inflexions, as well as the subject-matter, were given to them by direct inspiration of God.”

To this may be added the statement of the devoted Bishop of Liverpool: “On one point of vast importance in the present day, the reader will see that I hold very decided opinions. That point is inspiration. I feel no hesitation in avowing, that I believe in the plenary inspiration of every word of the original text of Holy Scripture. I hold not only that the Bible contains the word of God, but that every jot of it was written, or brought together, by Divine inspiration, and is the word of God . . . . For my own part, I believe that the whole Bible, as it came originally from the hands of the inspired writers, was verbally perfect and without a flaw. I believe that the inspired writers were infallibly guided by the Holy Ghost, both in their selection of matter and their choice of words.”

Such testimony by the ablest, the most learned, the most distinguished, the most faithful of God’s witnesses, might be multiplied indefinitely; but these samples are presented to put young men on their guard against the unfounded assertion that ” the results of the textual criticism are in conflict with verbal inspiration.” This is just the opposite of the truth, for the only textual criticism that is worthy of the name, not the mere hunting up of various readings, but the devout and diligent search into the derivation and meaning of words, reveals ten thousand proofs of verbal inspiration. There is scarcely a verse in the Scriptures that does not bring to light evidence of the most careful selection of language, and a supernatural guidance in the choice of words which the ablest modern scholarship is sometimes insufficient to render suitably, words just exactly adapted to show out delicate shades of meaning often lost in translations; and never once indicating ignorance or mistake on the part of the writer. If any one doubts this, let him, with the scope of a passage in view, attempt to improve its phraseology, and he will soon become convinced that the penmen of a rude and barbarous age far surpassed him in the proper selection of a phraseology of precise and wondrous accuracy. Let him also consider that in a book composed by so many different authors, of every degree of culture, intellect, and social rank, there is not one statement that is proved to be false by modern knowledge. Take up the apocryphal books, or the writings of the early fathers, some of whom were the immediate successors and even the companions of the apostles, and you meet with palpable absurdities and blunders. Why did not the apostles themselves fall into such absurdities and blunders, in some narrative or doctrinal teaching or illustration? Their writings have been subject to the fiercest, criticism for nearly eighteen hundred years, and as the highest scientific investigation can discover no error in them, we can only conclude that their very words were given by inspiration of God.

The “real discovery” of Astruc that the use of the divine names, Elohim and Jehovah, divides the book of Genesis into two great memoirs, betrays such a lack of spiritual intelligence that it is sad and painful to every believer. Even a child can understand why Elohim alone is used in the first chapter of Genesis, where only the work of creation is described; and why God takes the title of Jehovah Elohim in the second and third chapters, when man is brought upon the scene, and stands in covenant relation to the Almighty; and why Jehovah only is used in the fourth chapter, when it is a question of redemption. It was not Moses, therefore, who was the clumsy compiler, gathering up two great memoirs from independent documents which he found floating on the sea of ancient tradition, nor were there two or more writers engaged upon tlie history contained in Genesis, but it is the author of Biblical Study who fails to see the entire appropriateness of different names under varying circumstances.

He is a scholar, however, and he knows that the two leading divine names run side by side throughout the whole of the Old Testament, as well as in the Pentateuch or Hexateuch. Thus we have Elohim about 44 times, and Jehovah nearly 200 times in Judges: Elohim 3 times and Jehovah 18 times in Ruth: Elohim about 80 times and Jehovah about 330 times in 1 Samuel: Elohim about 50 times and Jehovah about 50 times in 2 Samuel: Elohim about 80 times and Jehovah about 260 times in 1 Kings: Elohim about 70 times and Jehovah about 275 times in 2 Kings: Elohim about 110 times and Jehovah about 180 times in 1 Chronicles: Elohim about 175 times and Jehovah about 375 times in 2 Chronicles: Elohim 53 times and Jehovah 40 times in Ezra; Elohim 70 times and Jehovah 18 times in Nehemiah: Elohim 17 times and Jehovah 32 times in Job: Elohim about 350 times and Jehovah about 680 times in the Psalms: Elohim 5 times and Jehovah nearly 90 times in Proverbs: Elohim about 85 times and Jehovah about 400 times in Isaiah; and so it is to the last of the prophets.

Why does not the Professor see a real discovery of two great memoirs and nine or more lesser ones in each of these books, as well as in Genesis? Precisely the same real discovery stares him in the face from Judges to Malachi which meets him in the Pentateuch, and it puzzles an unlearned man to know why the higher critics stop at the first five or six books with their independent documents, different authors, and small army of redactors and sub-redactors. Indeed they do not intend to stop, as shown in their treatment of Isaiah and other portions of the Scriptures, but if let alone for awhile they will drive their ploughshare from Genesis to Malachi, and then from Matthew to Revelation, pausing at last by the side of Baur and Strauss, and handing over their admirers and followers to rationalism and the devil.

But what has been said about Elohim and Jehovah does not fully show the absurdity of the argument that the use of these divine names proves the existence of “two great memoirs and nine lesser ones.” Very often the names occur within the limits of 9. single verse. For example, “they went in male and female of all flesh, as Elohim had commanded him; and Jehovah shut him in,” (Gen. vii. 16). “I will make thee swear by Jehovah, the Elohim of heaven,” (Gen. xxiv. 3); ” Then shall Jehovah be my Elohim,” (Gen. xxviii. 21); ” But Jehoshaphat cried out, and Jehovah helped him; and Elohim moved them to depart from him,” (2 Chron. xviii. 31); “In Elohim will I praise his word; in Jehovah will I praise his word;” (Ps. lvi. 10). Thus it is in scores of texts, and it certainly requires a very high criticism to discover in each of them two great memoirs, and nine lesser ones, and an indefinite number of redactors and subredactors in order to account for the use of the two divine names.

As to the assertion that “fiction is represented in the parables of Jesus,” and placing them on a level with the story of Tobit and Susanna, as to the assertion that ” higher criticism comes into conflict with the authority of Scripture when it finds that its statements are not authoritative and its revelations are not credible,” as to the assertion that there are legends and fables in the New Testament, “which do not commit the authors to their historical truthfulness,” it is monstrous and shocking. If such declarations, carefully written in a book, and no doubt deliberately uttered from the chair of instruction in the class-room, do not throw wide open the doors of the church to the stalking in of a defiant and rampant infidelity, and do not send forth the students for the ministry, who read and hear them, with no settled convictions of the divine origin of the book they are commissioned to make known to the people, then a sufficient cause will fail to be followed by its legitimate consequences.

There are many Christians who have no sympathy with the higher criticism in its “irreverent treatment of God’s word, and yet they are sorely perplexed about verbal inspiration. The manifest peculiarities of style in the various books of the Bible constitute, in their judgment, a serious objection to the statement that the Holy Spirit dictated the very words. But surely they ought to remember that when we have the clear and repeated testimony of the Sacred Scriptures to their verbal inspiration, this fact alone must sweep away their hastily formed conclusion which, after all, is the result of ignorance. “Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?” (Job xi. 7, 8).

It is very foolish to imagine that the eternal One, who is infinite in understanding, and the source of all wisdom, is subject to the limitations of man’s feeble little intellect, or forced to confine the operations of His mind within the narrow range of human experience. No one doubts that there are those among His creatures, with mental growth and development of fifty or sixty years at most, who can employ a great variety of styles in their writings. Bacon, for example, wrote on law, religion, philosophy, history, science, and it has been plausibly argued that he composed some of the plays attributed to Shakespeare. Sir Isaac Newton wrote on astronomy, mathematics, and prophecy, and while there was enough perhaps to indicate unity of authorship, there was certainly diversity in the modes of expression. Many others have turned their pens at different periods of a short life, or perhaps at the same periods, to a variety of subjects, now sending forth a romance, and then poetry, and then a careful discussion of political questions, and then their views of some scientific speculation; and although the literary style employed is suited to the topic presented, all the styles emanate from one and the same brain. If man who is but a worm can do this, what can not God do? May not He who formed the mind employ that mind to communicate His own thoughts and words, without any interference with the peculiarities it received from His creating hand?

Daily all over the civilized world organists are seated at their instruments, and by a touch of the keys and pedal they are calling forth through hundreds of pipes an almost endless variety of sounds. Some of them can cause at least a resemblance to the dash of waves upon the shore, to the roar of the hurricane, to the soft notes of a flute, to the cry of a child; but all must proceed from the same wind chest in obedience to the will of the same master mind. One who has stood in a vast garden, and thought of the innumerable shapes and colors and mingled odors about him, and then cast his thoughts over the vaster field of creation, and reflected that every one of these things was in the divine mind before it was formed by the divine handiwork, can only wonder at the foolishness that restricts the boundless resources of God. One who has watched the movements of a complicated machinery in factory or mill, and remembered that it is the product of a creature, who in comparison with the Creator is a senseless moth, a crawling caterpillar, a dull toad, can only be astonished at the stupidity which doubts the ability of God to utter His own words through the medium of a thousand different styles, if He so choose.

There is another common objection to the truth of verbal inspiration which has been recently expressed in a lecture full of evolution-infidelity and nonsense, delivered throughout the country by the most popular preacher in America. He is a man of unquestioned genius, which he has unquestionably exercised for evil. He is as much worse than an infidel as a dangerous enemy, who has stolen into the camp in the guise of a friend, is worse than an open foe in front. Like all other secret and avowed skeptics in the church, and all other heretics, he is bitterly hostile to verbal inspiration, and brings forward as an unanswerable argument against it the dissimilar language used by the four Evangelists in recording the inscription upon the Saviour’s cross. There is nothing original, however, in the argument, for it has been used times without number, and is used still until it has grown stale.

It does not seem to occur to him, and to better men who think there is force in the argument, that one of these four Evangelists wrote his account of the crucifixion before the others. All that the three had to do, therefore, was to copy precisely the words recorded by the first, and this a school boy could have done, and this the three would most certainly have done, were it not for verbal inspiration. They did not copy because the Holy Ghost directed them not to copy. He had His own special design in each of the four gospels, which together form the four equal sides of our Lord’s perfect life on the earth. In Matthew He is presented with special reference to His claim and title as the King of the Jews, in Mark as the obedient Servant predicted by Isaiah, in Luke as the Son of man, and in John as the Son of God. It will be found upon examination that the four modes of recording the inscription answer exactly to the purpose of the Holy Spirit in the four gospels.

Moreover the preface to the inscription in each gospel shows that it was the deliberate intention of the writers to record the words differently. In Matthew we are told that His executioners ” set up over his head, his accusation written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.” In Mark we are told “the superscription of his accusation was written over, THE KING OF THE JEWS.” In Luke we are told that “a superscription also was written over him, in letters of Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.” In John we are told that ” Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS.” Must not every candid reader see at a glance that these differences were designed, that they were not left to chance nor even to the choice of the writers, and that taken all together they make up the full inscription? So far, then, from disproving the truth of verbal inspiration, the testimony of the four Evangelists to the words placed on the cross, when carefully considered, is its triumphant demonstration.

Another difficulty lies in the way of many who are disposed to accept verbal inspiration, when they are reminded of the trivial nature of some statements found in the Bible. For example, for a hundred years men who reject this truth, have sneered at the assertion that the Holy Spirit directed the apostle to write to Timothy about an old cloke that had been left at Troas, (2 Tim. iv. 13). Well, if any Christian, and especially any minister of the gospel, can find it in their hearts to ridicule the tender care of the Divine Spirit for the comfort of His aged and faithful servant, awaiting martyrdom in a Roman dungeon, they are welcome to all the capital they can make out of the touching record.

In like manner every objection to the doctrine falls to the ground, and although the higher critics and other enemies of the Bible will continue to fight it, and mislead multitudes, it remains true to-day that “all scripture is given by inspiration of God.” All of the sacred writings from the first verse of Genesis to the last verse of Revelation were dictated by the Holy Spirit, and upon those portions which professed Christians and professors in theological seminaries denounce as fictions and legends, as the story of Jonah and the great fish and the destruction of Sodom, Jesus Christ and the inspired apostles have set the seal of their solemn sanction. The Bible is a unit, one perfect, indivisible whole, the Old Testament and the New Testament forming volume first and volume second of God’s revealed will and God’s communicated words; and men must either accept all of it, and through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ enter heaven at last, or they must reject all of it, and go into hell when they die.

That this is not too strong a statement will be obvious when we recall the relation of God’s word to the entire question of our salvation. By it we are begotten or born into newness of life. “Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures,” (Jas. i. 18). “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever,” (1 Pet. i. 23). ” In Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel,” (1 Cor. iv. 15). By it we are cleansed from the filthiness of the flesh. “Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto you,” (John xv. 3, Revised Version). ” Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish,” (Eph. v. 25-27).

By it we are practically sanctified, or set apart to the service of God. ” Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth,” (John xvii. 17-19). ” We are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth,” (2 Thess. ii. 13).

By it we are built up and nourished, as children advance from the feebleness of infancy to the strength of maturity. “And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified,” (Acts XX. 32). “As new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby: if so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious/’ (1 Pet. ii. 2, 3).

By it the secrets of the heart are made bare, and yet it furnishes the weapon of defence against the assaults of the devil. ” The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart,” (Heb. iv. 12). “And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,” (Eph. vi. 17).

By it God accomplishes His will in the scheme of redemption. “As the rain cometh down, and the snow, from heaven, and returnieth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater; so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void; but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it,” (Isa. Iv. 10, 11). ” Is not my word like as a fire? saith the Lord; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?” (Jer. xxiii. 29).

By it human destiny is decided. Abraham said to the rich man in hell pleading in behalf of his five brethren, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said. Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead,” (Luke xvi. 29-31). “He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him at the last day,” (John xii. 48).

We are not surprised, therefore, to find the scriptures called the oracles of God, or that which God has spoken. “What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God,” (Rom. iii. 1, 2). They are called the word of God, because God is their author and revealer. ” So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God,” (Rom. X. 17). They are called the word of the Lord, because God manifest in the flesh, Jehovah Jesus, they everywhere set forth. ” The word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you,” (1 Pet. i. 25). They are called the word of Christ, because Christ is the subject, the sum, and the substance. ” Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,” (Col. iii. 16). They are called the word of life, because they alone secure life to the dead soul. ” Holding forth the word of life,” (Phil. ii. 16). They are called the word of truth, because they contain the truth without admixture of error. ” In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,” (Eph. i. 13). They are called the word of faith, because they are to be believed. “The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt he saved,” (Rom. x. 9).

Thus does the Holy Spirit seek to impress upon us in every way the unspeakable importance and inestimable value of the sacred Scriptures, not one word of which from the first of Genesis to the last of Revelation could be changed but for the worse. Every verse, every line, the tense of every verb, the number of every noun, and every little particle are worthy of devout and diligent study; and such study would reveal new beauties, and marvellous proofs of superhuman wisdom, and a more profound conviction each day that such a book can come only from God.

Since the fall of man He has placed before us but two perfect objects, the incarnate Word and the written word, and the relation between the two is most intimate and precious. The former is everywhere revealed in the latter, and he who reads a chapter in the Old Testament or the New, and does not find Christ there has read it unintelligently. “Search the scriptures,” He said to the Jews; “for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me,” (John v. 39). “And beginning at Moses, and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself . . . . And they said one to another. Did not our heartburn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures? . . . And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me. Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures,” (Luke xxiv. 27, 32, 44, 45).

This is just what is needed now, for when by His Spirit He opens to us the Scriptures, and opens the understanding that we may understand the Scriptures, we will be more like Paul who, as his manner was, went in unto the Jews, “and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead,” (Acts xvii. 3); and who said to king Agrippa, ” Having therefore obtained help of God, I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come: that Christ should suffer, and that he should be the first that should rise from the dead, and should show light unto the people, and to the Gentiles,” (Acts xxvi. 22, 23). Let Christ be the object before the mind, and the dryest details of Old Testament history, and the Old Testament ritual, become radiant with glory.

But there is another aspect in which the incarnate Word and the written word may be viewed as inseparably linked together, and bearing to each other the closest resemblance. In both we find a divine and a human element, and in both the human element is perfect, absolutely free from the touch of error or failure. Christ was and is forevermore God in the true and fullest sense. But His humanity had upon it no taint of sin from the first Adam’s fallen nature, because He was begotten by the Holy Ghost. Precisely so is it with the written word. It is divine in the true and fullest sense, and it is also human in the true and fullest sense, but that which is human in it is far removed from human mistakes, because it was produced by the Holy Ghost. This has ever been the faith of those most deeply read in the oracles of God, for as Auberlen says, ” The substance of the old Protestant doctrine of inspiration may be expressed in these words: the Holy Spirit dictated the Bible verbally, and the human composers are not authors, but only the writers — indeed, only the hands or the pens.”

Such a mechanical view of inspiration, as it is called, is now almost universally rejected, but it is far less dishonoring to God, and far less dangerous to the souls of men, than the rash statements so often heard from pulpits, and so often seen in the writings of ministers, claiming to be evangelical. It has come to pass that if any declaration of the Bible does not fall in with the popular belief, or with the judgment of human reason, or with a shallow reform, or with the deductions of some impertinent and half-fledged science, it is treated by multitudes of Christ’s professed ambassadors as a dream, or a vision, or a fiction, or a legend, or a fable. Poor fools! they do not see that for the sake of gaining a little notoriety, or of winning a reputation for culture, they are playing into the hands of infidelity, and undermining the foundations of the church, and proclaiming with unblushing cheek their treachery to their Lord and His word.

But when professors in theological seminaries, appointed to train young men for the gospel ministry, are engaged in writing books that, if believed, must inevitably destroy the confidence of the common people in the Bible, it is a still more appalling sign of the times. Doubtless they are quite honest in their conviction that they are advancing the cause of the truth, and that the alleged discoveries of the higher criticism will lead to a more intelligent acquaintance with the Scriptures. Doubtless they think that they are doing God service, as did the Jews who gathered around the cross; but if so, once more is the prayer of the divine Sufferer needed in their behalf, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”