fallible, and cannot, therefore, be considered Divine; but it is an unfounded assumption that the portions of the Bible which contain narratives are unessential; it is a misconception of the spirit of the Scriptures, to regard, for instance, the account of the Creation, of the Flood, or the wanderings of the Israelites in the desert, as collateral or indifforent; the Bible itself makes no distinction between important and unimportant parts; it insists, on the contrary, that no single word ought to be added or taken away; either the whole of the Bible is Divine or the whole is not Divine; any intermediato opinion is a feeble and unavailing compromise, whether arising from insincerity or from a conviction too timid to follow out its own consequences. On the other hand, if the Scriptures are the work of human reason, it is difficult to understand, why human reason should never be able to pass beyond them, and write something more perfect; it is against all historical evidence to assume that man reached some thousands of years ago the utmost degree of enlightenment of which he is capable, and that over afterwards his only task consists in preserving and protecting the intellectual treasures then discovered; this we repeat is untrue; for we know that man has, since those times, immeasurably advanced in every valuable acquirement; that he has in particular made marvellous progress in those branches of knowledge which disclose the depths of the human mind and the mechanism of the universe, in philosophy and the natural sciences; and that even now ho fools he has scarcely mastered more than the rudiments of either; as men wrote the books of the Bible, so men can, at subsequent periods, write books that surpass the Bible; and later again, works superior to the books that surpass the Bible; and till the genius of mankind is degenerated or exhausted, every following generation will attempt to outstep the efforts of anterior ages. 6. PROPHECY. The gift of prophecy which all ancient nations attributed to elected favourites of the deity, is again nothing elso but the gift of human reason and judgment, striving to penetrate through the veil of the future, and hence naturally liable to error. We are far from denying the peculiar importance and the most blissful influence of the Hebrew "prophets"; they were the ever movable element of Israel's religious training; they counteracted, and for a long time successfully, that stagnation which the growth of the Levitical spirit threatened to produce; they fought with undaunted courago against the narrowness of the priesthood, and ofton against tho prosumption of kings; they vindicatod the rights of the spirit against the rigid lifelessness of for mulas, and of morality and virtue against the encroachments of ritualism and the dogma; they appealed with fervour and glowing eloquence to the hearts and consciencos, not to the fears and projudicos of their hearers; they loved their country with almost enthusiastic patriotism; uplifted by the feeling of a higher impulse and assistance, they were enlightened teachers in religion, and clear-sighted counsellors in politics; these objects the purification of faith, the improvement of morals, and the advancement of national prosperity constituted their chief mission; prediction of the future was only their subordinate function; the erroneous translation of the Hebrew word navi by prophet, while it means "overflowing speakor", has frequently caused its innermost import to be misunderstood and distorted; for it raises the accessory activity to almost exclusive importance. The prophets of the Hebrews, highminded and unselfish, unequalled as a class in singleness of motive and purity of enthusiasm, in intrepidity and perseverance, practical experience and literary ability, doservo indeed the superiority over those of any other nation; they showed, moreover, greater sagacity in the dolinoation of futuro occurrences, since they were mostly political charactors, moving in the very current of public life; but they wore not the loss fallible; their activity was absolutely tied to the ordinary limits of the human mind; and therefore, they occasionally predicted events which either were not fulfilled at all, or happened in a different manner and form. Thus Amos foretold, "Jeroboam shall die by the sword and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land" whereas the historical account rolatos, "that he slept with his fathers, and Nadab his son reigned in his stoad." Joromiah prophesied of king Jehoiakim, that "he shall be buried in the burial of an ass, and drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem"; but history tells us that "he slept with his fathers." Again, Jeremiah foretold concerning the Edomites, that all their towns would be given up to eternal desolation, that in fact their whole territory would be converted into a dreary, uninhabited desert, the horror and mockery of all strangers, like Sodom and Gomorrah, and that they themselves would be carried away by Nebuchadnezzar like helpless lambs; and gloomy predictions of a similar nature, likewise suggested by deep and implacable hatred, woro pronounced by Ezokiol," Obadiah, 12 and other 1 VII. 11. 7 2 1 Ki. XIV. 20. 3 9 Ver. 20; comp. Lam. IV. 21. 10 Comp. Ps. CXXXVII. 7; Ezek. XXXV. 5. 11 XXXV. 3, 4, 6-9, 14, 15; XXV. 12-14. 12 Vers. 5, 9, 10, 18. 10 writers. 13 Now the Edomites were indeed subjugated by the Babylonians, 14 and suffered considerable injuries; 15 but they remained in their land; they succeeded even in appropriating to themselves a part of southern Judea including Hebron, 16 which was, therefore, frequently callod Idumon; thoy took an active part in the Maccabean wars, 17 in the course of which they were compelled by John Hyrcanus (about B. C. 130) to adopt the rite of circumcision, and were incorporated in the Jewish commonwealth. Ezekiel promised the political re-union of the empires of Israel and Judah, 18 which has never been realised. The total destruction of Gaza is repeatedly predicted in distinct terms; yet the town exists to the present day. The coincidences are certainly much more numerous than the failures; but the prophecies wore commonly pronounced in general, and often in vague terms; the pootical elevation and the rhetorical emphasis with which they were set forth, were even unfavourable to nice accuracy; precise details were avoided, names of persons never mentioned, 20 and dates usually stated in round numbers, or altogether omitted. Moreover, many professed prophecies are in reality nothing but history in the form of prophecies; they were composed after the events to which they relate; for ancient writers, especially if wishing to furnish a comprehensive survey of the past, or to endow national institutions with a higher authority, wore accustomed to make pious and renowned men of carlior ages pronounce the facts as prophecies, which, howovor, woro desired by the authors to be regarded as roal predictions of the men to whom they ascribed them a style of writing which recommends itself by impressive solemnity, and to which Hebrew literature owes some of its finest and choicest compositions. Besides, the Bible teaches that false prophets may utter predictions which God allows to be realised in order to try the Hobrows whether they love Him with all their hearts; 21 and to crown the confusion, the truthful or fraudulent nature of prophecies given in the name of Jehovah, was according to the Law to be tested by their realisation; predictions proclaimed in the name of Jehovah but not justified by the event, were regarded as criminal deceptions to be punished by the death of the impostor: 22 thus the 13 Joel IV, 9; Am. I. 11; Isai. XXXIV. 5-15; LXIII. 1—6. 14 Jer. XXXVII. 3, 6. 15 Mal. I. 3, 4; Ezek. XXXII. 29. 18; 18 Ezek. XXXVII, 22. 19 Am. I. 6, 7; Jerem. XLVII. 1 sqq.; Zeph. II. 4; comp. Zech. IX. 5. 20 The mention of Cyrus by the second Isaiah at once betrays and proves the real time in which this author lived and wrote. 21 Deut. XIII. 4; comp. Ezek. XIV. 9. 22 Deut. XVIII. 20--22. practical value of prophecies as such was extremely precarious and almost nugatory. In short, the belief in prophecy has the same origin as the doctrines of revelation and inspiration namely, the impossible supposition that the deity enters into a direct and personal intercourse with some men specially chosen. But these notions are, moreover, the source of other errors, widely diffused in ancient times, and also shared and recognised by the authors of the Scriptures the faith in oracles and dreams. Minds unaccustomed to independence and self-reliance, and untrained in tracing cause and effect, were led to suppose that, in perplexing situations, they might be enlightened and guided by an immediate communication from the deity, whether this were conveyed through the medium of a person, or through the instrumentality of a consecrated object. Who can contemplate, without grief and pity, the fraud and the mischief necessarily caused by so irrational a belief? The most important privato and public enterprises woro made dependent on the heart or livor of a sacrificial animal, on the smoke or flamo of the firo on the altar, on the flight or cry of birds, the movement of serpents, or the neighing of horses, on the figures formed in the wator of a goblot, on lightning or an eclipse of the sun or moon, on comets and meteors, on the position of rods or arrows thrown on the ground, the decision of lots, the persons first seen or met in the morning or just after deliberating on some enterprise, and on thousand similar chances which possessed no conceivable connection with the matter at issue, and the interpretation of which was left to the shrewdness or cunning of the official expositors. Soothsaying became a trade, and the soothsayers were used as tools of the powerful, if they did not serve their own avarice or ambition. Auguries often checked the most promising, and encouraged the most pernicious schemes. Oracles were consulted for private and for public purposes; and they not soldom helped to produce the effects which they predicted. Now, the Bible forbids indeed to consult on the future the heathen gods or their ministers, or to indulge in divination, magic, or necromancy, but it unreservedly sanctions oracles requested of the God of the Hebrews through the prophets or by the Urim and Thummim, or granted by dreams or by lot. Let us now try to sum up the result of the preceding remarks. It is not sufficient to appeal from the letter of the Bible to its spirit; indeed the one "kills", but oven the other is no longer life and truth to us. The spirit of the Bible is not the spirit of our time; it is not the light that illumines our path or points to our goal. Many suppose they have removed all difficulties by urging that religion is to be separated from philosophy; that "there exists between both neither community nor relationship", because, as they contend, one aims at obedience and piety, the other at truth, and the foundations of the former are Scripture and revelation, of the latter nature and general notions; that the Bible is not intended to teach science, and condemns disobedience but not ignorance; that therefore all speculation which does not directly make men obey God, whether it relates to the knowledge of God or the knowledge of natural things, does not concern Scripture, and is to be kept apart from revealed religion. But we adjure those who adopt this view of Bacon, Spinoza, and others, to weigh its true scope and tendency. What, in the name of truth, is left for religion to achieve, if it renounces to teach the knowledge of God and the knowledge of natural things? How can it satisfy man's nature, and be to him all in all, if it disregards and leaves untouched his most essential interests? how can it claim to direct vigorous and intelligent minds, if it excludes truth from its sphere, overlooks nature, and banishes from its doctrines gencral notions? If it is declared that it is not the business of religion to enquire what is God, "whether Fire, Mind, Light, Thought, or anything else, or to examine in what sense God is the prototype of true life, whether because He has a just and merciful heart, or because all things exist and act through Him, and man therefore also thinks through Him and discerns through Him what is right and good, for it is indifferent what everyone sets forth on these matters"; if, more questionably still, it is asserted, that faith is in no way concerned whether people believe "that God is omnipotent by virtue of His essence or of His power, whether He governs all things by liberty or the necessity of nature, whether He prescribes laws as ruler or teaches them as eternal truths, whether man obeys God from liberty of will or from the compulsion of a Divine decree, and whether the reward of the good and the punishment of the wicked is natural or supernatural in its modo": if, we repeat, religion admits such principles, it works its own destruction; it can have no importance for man, if it eschews his deepest and most sacred problems. Viewed in this manner, religion and philosophy are not sisters, but are forced to become deadly rivals. The separation of both does not involve their conciliation but their hostile opposition. That fatal division bears the guilt of the unhappy confusion which convulsed many centuries. Safety and peace do not lie in the contrast but in the union, or rather in the identity of both. Truth is one and indivisible. It is a paradox to assume a religious truth in contradistinction to a philosophical truth. Faith has no power and U |