Biblical scholar

“ The peculiar glories of Bible religion are not dimmed in presence of these other lights. Allowing for whatever is valuable in these systems of belief, we may still allege that Bible religion comprises all that is good in them, and has, besides, many precious features peculiar to itself; we may still maintain that their excellences are rather testimonies to the truth of the biblical teachings about God, than difficulties in the way of a rational faith ”

“ It is universally admitted that it ought to present what is taught in the Bible as to the origin, nature, faculties, states, processes, and future development of the human spirit, and also elicit the conceptions implied and pre-supposed in the Biblical statements on these points. ”

“ The favourable reception accorded to an exposition of the Sermon on the Mount has encouraged me to attempt another practical explanation of a portion of the New Testament, in the interest of such readers as are intelligent indeed, but neither are nor hope to become critical scholars. An immense deal has been done of late to assist New Testament scholarship, but while the studies of the scholar make progress, the ordinary Christian 'reading of the Bible' is, I fear, at best at a standstill. ”

“ Of all the contributions to the study of the Scriptures with which research, scholarship and thought have enriched our age, none are more fruitful than those which belong to the province of Biblical Theology. Strange as it may appear, while the Bible has been the final authority appealed to in the teaching of dogmatic Theology all down the ages, Biblical Theology is a new science, undreamed of by all but comparatively recent [52] scholars. ”

“ The central truths of Christianity are always the same; but Biblical criticism, the comparative study of Hebrew or Christian epochs, the domain of doctrinal thought, are growths of the human mind, and every advance has been the fruit of experimental searching. ”

“ If we find in the Bible any plain, intelligible teaching of God, will it do to set up our reason against the teaching of Him, who is infinite reason and infinite wisdom?
If any truth is plain in the Bible, is it not that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in human flesh or in fashion as a man by his sufferings on the cross made atonement for the sins of the world? ”

“ Then I began the Bible, determined in my own mind to know whether God or man was the author. I spent the greater part of two years in reading and comparing scripture with scripture, prophecy with history, and I had not gone half through with the reading of it, before I was perfectly satisfied of its divine origin. No mortal man, or men, could have written with such harmony, wisdom, and truth, without inspiration. The Bible answered all my inquiries, settled all my doubts, established my faith, and gave me hope which has been nearly or quite twenty-seven years an anchor to my soul. ”

“ God designed the Bible to be a lesson-book to all mankind, in childhood, youth, and manhood, and to be studied through all time. He gave His word to men as a revelation of Himself. Every new truth discerned is a fresh disclosure of the character of its Author. The study of the Scriptures is the means divinely ordained to bring men into closer connection with their Creator, and to give them a clearer knowledge of His will. ”

“ The professor may now safely pass on to the use of Scripture in matters of theology. On this head it must be observed that, in addition to the usual reasons which make ancient writings more or less difficult to understand, there are some which are peculiar to the Bible. For the language of the Bible is employed to express, under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, many things which are beyond the power and scope of the reason of man—that is to say, divine mysteries and all that is related to them. ”

“ The science of biblical criticism has gained from the study of general history a larger knowledge of the nature of man, which, in turn, has made the study of the Bible more profound and thorough, because more real and human than were the biblical studies of the eighteenth century. ”

“ These interpretations are really human inventions—the product of the ingenious thinking of theologians like Calvin and Luther. Yet they have so authenticated themselves that for most readers to-day the Bible means solely what it meant for the exacerbated theological mind of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. If religion is to be vital, if knowledge of the Bible is to be genuine and real, there must be a critical examination of what this book means for the disinterested intelligence of to-day; the Bible, as literature, must be interpreted anew, sympathetically and imaginatively ”

“ Before any of the New Testament Scriptures existed, there were a great many Christians in Judaea, Samaria and the pagan world, for the Christian faith was not spread by the reading of the Scriptures, but by the living word and teaching of the apostles and their disciples, or, in other words, by the Church as a teacher. 2. If the infallible Church were not at hand to enlighten us, we could not know for certain what books belong to the inspired Scriptures, nor could we be sure that the Bible, as we have it, is complete and unfalsified. ”

“ The third theory, which is a modification of the second, is that of essential inspiration, which distinguishes matters of doctrine and conduct as closely related to God’s purpose in the Scriptures from the remaining contents of the Scripture, and claims for the Bible only such inspiration as was necessary to secure accuracy in regard to these. The theology and the morality of the Bible are inspired, but not its history, science, philosophy. ”

“ This work discussed various subjects in which the older theological positions had been rendered untenable by modern research, and brought to bear upon them the views of the newer school of biblical interpretation. The authors were, as a rule, scholars in the prime of life, holding influential positions in the universities and public schools. ”

“ In a plain, weighty, nervous style, rising at times to rugged eloquence, he defends the Bible as the sole source of religious knowledge, and the Apostles' Creed as containing all that is necessary to salvation. ”

“ Though the Bible is not mere history or mere literature, it nevertheless has to do with history, and it is literature in the highest sense of the word. It has a human element as well as a Divine element; and how far the books are human and how far Divine is the great Scripture problem. ”

“ Of all books, whether rhetoric, logic, vocabulary, poetry, philosophy, history, or whatever be the end, the Bible should be first and most carefully studied, its literary spirit and form should be closely traced and discerned, and its truth should be reverently incorporated into the daily speech, thought and life. ”

“ For the old-time friends of the Bible, the night of darkness and doubt is rapidly passing; the morning of a fuller knowledge and a fuller confidence is at hand. Gone are those agonies of doubt regarding the truthfulness of the Bible's history and the adequacy of its ethics for the needs of our modern world. ”

“ The other day my attention was called to an announcement of a series of Sunday evening discourses by a city pastor, on "The Gospel in Recent Fiction," in the course of which he proposed to speak of the spiritual and ethical teaching of some half-dozen of the popular novels of the day. I could not but think if he had put the same time and interest into the reading and analysis of as many books of the Bible, he would have worked less and accomplished more. ”

“ Religious teachers and scientific investigators will work shoulder to shoulder in a common study and interpretation of God's many-sided revelation. Pastors will feel the solid foundations of historical truth beneath their feet. Leaving behind the din and distractions of the transitional period, the disciples of the Great Teacher will go forth with fresh zeal to make the eternal truths of the Bible regnant in the lives of men, and the kingdom of God a reality in human history. ”

“ This is the Gospel which has been taught to us to-day, in a plain and simple manner, and in that simplicity that it was taught by Jesus Christ and his Apostles, and by many others who were ordained by them. The people profess to believe the Bible; the whole Christian world profess to believe that book—to believe that it is the Bible, but do they believe what is in that Bible? ”

“ The Lord has been "our dwelling-place in all generations," whether Moses or some other psalmist penned that line; and Jesus is the bread of life, whether the apostle John or some other disciple whom Jesus loved records that experience. Scholars may make the meaning of the Scriptures much plainer by their searching studies; and they must be encouraged to investigate as minutely and rigorously as they can. To be fearful that the Bible cannot stand the test of the keenest study, is to lack faith in its divine vitality. ”

“ The average man will reason about the great mysteries quite as much as the scholar; perhaps more than the true scholar, and with more insistent dogmatism. To the issue of that simpler, nobler Religion of Christ which is struggling to the birth within the womb of Christianity, in the travail throes that are upon our age, it is of vital moment that all intelligent people should learn to use their Bibles intelligently in a knowledge of the nature of its writings, and in reasonable reasonings therefrom. ”

“ The fuller knowledge of our age, in evanishing the unreal Bible restores the real Bible. It is the record of the visioning and embodiment of the Human Ideal, the Divine Image—The Christ. It is the Providentially prepared Hand Book of religion in whose rich and varied phases of ethical and spiritual thought all men may find the nourishment they need. ”

“ If we examine what is termed the sacred history of the Bible, we shall find that in the various ages of the world, until soon after Christianity was introduced, there was a feeling among men to call upon God and to have their prayers answered—a feeling that if they would approach the Most High and call upon his name in faith, he would answer their supplications and give unto them wisdom, intelligence and revelation for the guidance of their feet in the pathway of life ”

“ As the primary function of Christ is redemptive, so the inspiration of the Bible is directed to make men “wise unto salvation.” (8) It is the presence and influence in the souls of men of the same Spirit of God as inspired the Scriptures which makes the Bible effective as a means of grace; and only those who yield themselves to the Spirit of God have the witness in themselves that the Bible conveys to them the truth and the grace of God. ”

“ We notice that the Bible, when speaking of God, never gives an opinion, never speculates. It always, in simple and majestic measure declares, as in the opening sentence of the Bible, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” ”

“ Since the day of his birth, the firm, unwavering, fanatical belief that the Bible was God's direct, unchangeable revelation to man, made him, as it had made his father, impregnable to the assaults of reason. ”

“ This new conception, thus answering to the historico-psychological reality of the development of the human mind, by distinguishing what in the Bible is religious and moral truth—the special object of its teaching—from what is merely explanation and development of it, avails providentially to save its veracity, its inerrancy, its inspiration. ”

“ Its Self Convincing Power in Experience.—There is in the consciousness of man a conviction that the religion of the Bible rests upon a sound foundation. And he who puts the Bible to the test in his own experience, who lives its life, and follows its law, and enjoys its communings, finds an assurance to the satisfaction of his spiritual nature, that this book contains God’s message to his soul. Every Christian’s experience is, therefore, a testimony to the truth and the inspiration of Scripture. ”

“ Once more I turn to the young men to say, if you would make life safe take the Bible as the man of your counsel and the guide of your life; love God and keep His commandments. In this age of glittering literature, many consider the Bible dull reading. ”

“ In the matter of religions it is particularly easy to distinguish the two orders of question. Every religious phenomenon has its history and its derivation from natural antecedents. What is nowadays called the higher criticism of the Bible is only a study of the Bible from this existential point of view, neglected too much by the earlier church. ”

“ THAT reading and study are very imperfect which do not bring to all our young people a knowledge of the general contents of the Bible. The Old and New Testaments contain the best moral and religious thought and belief of two important epochs in man's history—the Hebrew and Christian periods. ”

“ And if the evidence of the truth of the Bible satisfied men of such high intellectual capacity, ought it not to satisfy us? We do not wish to insinuate that we ought to believe in the Divinity of the Scriptures merely because they believed it. ”

“ If the prophets that were among them did not speak directly to every case, yet they had the written word, and to that they must have recourse. Note, Those will never be drawn to consult wizards that know how to make a good use of their Bibles. Would we know how we may seek to our God, and come to the knowledge of his mind? ”

“ First is the Bible, of which not only is an intelligent knowledge necessary for your healthy growth in religious life, but--which is of less consequence, indeed--it is as necessary for your tolerable understanding of the literature, or even science, of a world which for eighteen centuries has been under the steady influence of the Bible. ”