RELIGIOUS PHRASEOLOGY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 8889, 27 May 1892, Page 3

RELIGIOUS PHRASEOLOGY.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, You have already allowed me to draw the attention of your readers to the change of meaning passing over certain theological terms. With your kind permission I desire to notice a few more instances. The evidence which I shall adduce will be taken mainly from the writings of one who is an acknowleged authority in Biblical exegesis and a temperate theologian, even if of the liberal school. First, as regards the Bible itself. "The Bible," says Professor Kirkpatrick, " is a unique book ; but no absolute monopoly of truth is to be claimed for it, as sometimes seems to be asserted. God left not Himself without a witness, even in the heathen world." Speaking of the human elenie.nl in the Old Testament Scriptures, the same writer says :—" The human element in them is large, larger perhaps than we are readily willing to admit; and, so far as this element is concerned, they (the Old Testament Books) cannot be exempted from literary and historical criticism, nay, they cannot be explained without it." Again, in reference to theories of inspiration, the Professor says:— The proposition that ' Scripture is the Word of God,' has been hardened into the dogma of the verbal inspiration, and absolute inerrancy of every word of the Bible." The authorship of the books of the Old Testament is thus commented on : " May there not be included in the same book the writings of prophets other than the one whose name it bears? May not the title represent (so to speak) a school rather than an individual ?" It may be added that Professor Kirkpatrick admits the composite authorship of the Pentateuch, of Isaiah, and of the Psalms. " The books of the Old Testament have grown to their present form by processes of editing and compilation and collection going on through long periods." On no subject have men's notions been so revolutionised as on that of creation. The first chapter of Genesis has probably been more discussed than any other passage of Holy Scripture. Many attempts have been made to harmonise its statements with the teaching of modern science. It now seems impossible to deny that a similar story of the creation was current among the Babylonians. " The common origin of the Chaldeans and Biblical narratives of the creation and the flood cannot be disputed. . . . The first chapter of Genesis is not, as we now know, a scientifically exact account of creation." This conclusion leaves ample room for the investigations of scientific workers; but we cannot help remarking that the concession has been purchased by long and bitter controversy and not a little persecution. And now what about the Fall of man ? Let us hear the most recent utterances of biblical interpretation. " The account of the Fall is, it may be, an allegory rather than a history in the strict sense of the term. . . . Whatever may be the origin of the narrative, whether or not it was brought from the Mesopotamian home of the race, it has been adopted by inspiration, and stamped with a Divine authority, as teaching us what we can know of ' man's first disobedience,' and the entry of sin into the world by the opposition of man's will to God's." very good, but this account is very different from the story with which our ears were once familiar. The " opposition of man's will to God's " is not the ofddocrine of the Fall. Lastly, a word about miracles. " Miracles do not happen," said Matthew Arnold. Miracles, in any sense which represents them as occurrences contravening the natural order, are now discredited. No one expects miracles to happen, no one values them as evidence of a Divine mission. They are generally ruled out of court. The strong tendency to spiritualise the meaning of some important doctrines is shown in the explanations given of the resurrection and ascension. By the resurrection of the body was once understood the reconstruction and resuscitation of the material body laid In the grave. We are now assured that the resurrection of the body means something very different. Saint Paul is quoted as teaching the immateriality of the resurrection—" Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. Thou sowest not that body that, shall be." Bishop Weatcott

says : In shaping for ourselves the belief iii the resurrection of the flesh, we need to use more than common care lest we allow gross ( earthly thoughts to intrude into a realm where they have no place. The flesh of which we speak as destined to a resurrection is not that substance which we can see and handle, measured by properties of sense. It represents, as far as we now see, ourselves in our actual weakness, but essentially ourselves. . . . We should have been spared many sad perplexities, many grievous misrepresentations, if we had clung to St. Paul's figure of the seed in looking to our future resurrection. There is no question of the regathering of material particles, no encouragement for unsatisfying appeals to God's omnipotence. . . . The seed determines what the plant shall be, but it does not contain the plant." The Ascension of Christ is another phrase which appears to be undergoing a modification of meaning. The word ascension naturally suggests change of place, and that undoubtedly is the sense conveyed by the word to most minds. But says Bishop Westcott, We are not to think of the ascension of Christ as of a change of position, of a going immeasurably far from us. It is rather a change of the mode of existence, a passing to God, of whom we cannot say that he is then rather than here."

If space permitted we might pass in review other theological expressions which our most enlightened teachers no longer use in old senses. Indeed some of these venerable terms are quietly falling into the background. One does not hear so much now of justification by faith, imputed righteousness, predestination. We hear rather of salvation by character, of the reign of law. The Pauline theology is declared to have been obscured by formularising commentators. The best commentary on his writings is an ordinary home. When the natural order thus asserts itself we may see how great has been the influence of those who have made nature their special study. There are many who feel that Christianity becomes " more spiritual, as well as more clear, when it becomes more natural."

Another feature of our time worth noting is the increasing use of the terms myth and allegory in .describing biblical narratives which have hitherto been generally taken as strictly historical. A writer already quoted says on this point, " Exception is sometimes taken to the application or the term myth or allegory to the story of the Fall, as though it of necessity implied a doubt as to the essential reality of the truth conveyed by the story, I desire most emphatically to disclaim any such intention. But Ido hold that it ia legitimate to maintain that this narrative is not to be understood as literal history any more than the visions of the Apocalypse are to be understood as literal descriptions of Heaven. For us, the underlying truth, and not the outward form in which that truth is clothed, is the essential thing." Would that such opinions had always prevailed ! The Christian world of to-day would then have been better than it is.

If the extracts given above represent fairly the newer and_ truer views of the Bible ana Christian doctrine, what about our ordinary pulpit teaching, our Sunday-school instruction, our examinations of candidates for the ministry? Are we recognising adequately the fact that the world has moved forward, and that consequently much of the old religious teaching needs to be recast and brought up to date ? The old commendation of the preacher sounds ironical now —" he spoke as a dying man to dying men." We require him to speak as a living man to living men,—l am, etc., Inquirer-