LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

of one book." While the center of his studies must be the Scriptures, he has undertaken to explain, his very explanation of them is largely dependent on his gleanings from other fields of learning. Formerly the Bible was regarded by itself in dazzling isolation, like a statue set on a pedestal. Now we discover that we can see it much better when it stands in its place, which is not a mere niche in the wall of the temple of humanity, but the central shrine of all history. The life and thought of the world in which the New Testament first appeared must not be treated as the mere frame of the picture, although even that would be something, for a suitable frame helps to show its contents to the best advantage. But we should rather think of the circumstances and setting of the gospel and apostolic stories as background and even in part foreground to the Christian revelation. It must be confessed that sometimes these accessories are painted with so much Pre-raffaelite force and color that there is a danger of missing the message of the picture owing to the distraction of the accessories. A knowledge of the geography of Palestine, Eastern manners and customs, the state of the Roman world at the time of Christ, contemporary Greek philosophy, and a host of other matters more or less remote from the central theme of the New Testament, must not be allowed to overshadow that central theme. The picturesqueness of modern writing threatens this danger; and modern writing is nothing if it is not picturesque. But true illustration, such as is aimed at in the Expositor's Bible, goes deeper. It does not detract from the interest of the New Testament itself by the meretricious charms of the surroundings, a materializing and secularizing of the sacred and spiritual of which some of the most popular modern Lives of Christ are guilty. On the contrary, it seeks to throw light on the New Testament itself, explaining obscurities, vivifying what had not been fully realized before, setting the whole picture before us in warm colors of life. Used in this way the fruits of the Palestine Exploration Fund prove to be of great value. Then scholars of contemporary Jewish life and thought have enabled us to see more clearly the actual condition of the people among whom Jesus lived,60 and those who have been investigating the history and archæology of the Roman Empire of this period have enabled us to see much more clearly, how the Apostles carried out their wider mission, how the first churches were founded in the larger world, and how the primitive Christian life was lived in the midst of pagan surroundings.61

VI. – LIFE AND HISTORY OF THE EARLY CHURCH

      Making use of such materials as have been indicated above, several scholars have been attempting the difficult task of writing the Life of Christ,62 and several also the more manageable work of giving an account of the history of Apostolic times. Here we see that the destructive criticism which made havoc of history under the hands of the famous "Tübingen school" has been almost entirely superseded by constructive efforts which have brought out the circumstances of primitive times with remarkable clearness. The learned, sober studies of Hort in England,63, as well as the writings of Prof. Ramsay already referred to; the brilliant work of Weizsäcker64 in Germany; the histories of McGiffert,65 of the school of Harnach, and of Prof. Bartlet, a singularly judicious and discerning writer,66 are among the most prominent contributions to a right understanding of the events of the Apostolic times. Indeed, it is not too much to say that the research and criticism of recent days have brought us face to face with the primitive age of Christianity in a manner never attainable during any of the intermediate ages. It is as though we of the twentieth century had gained a height from which we could look across the intervening centuries, many of which lie wrapped in mist, and see clear and sharp against the horizon the blue hills of the wonderful first century.

VII. – NEW TESTAMENT THEOLOGY

      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 scholars. The old method was to start with a proposition, a thesis, a dogma, and then hunt through the Bible for proof texts. This was the method of the one supremely great work in Systematic Theology which Protestantism has produced – Calvin's Institutes. The great reformer first states his dogma and then proceeds to marshal texts in proof of it, following this process by a refutation of objections and an explaining away of apparently adverse texts. You can prove anything in that way. This vicious method accounts for the fact that all the wildest heresies and extravagances of fanaticism, as well as all the great mutually opposed systems of Divinity that have appeared in Christendom, have been able to appeal triumphantly to Scripture in proof of their contentions. Such a confusion of results should have been accepted as the reductio ad absurdum of the method.

      But now the new process of the study of Biblical Theology follows a more modest but more scientific method. It does not start with any dogma which it seeks to prove; it even dispenses with the "working hypothesis" which science admits to be legitimate. It is wholly inductive. Its aim is simply to discover what the Scriptures teach, no matter whether this should turn out to be favorable to preconceived notions or the reverse. In pursuit of this object it seeks to divest the mind of a mass of irrelevant and distracting notions, the accumulation of ages of Christian thinking and controversy, and work its way back to the times in which the several books were written, viewing them in the atmosphere of their origin. It approaches each book rather from what went before than from what came after, seeing that a thing is usually conditioned by its antecedents, but never by its sequels. Then it segregates the writings of each school or class of teachers, and further the specific teaching of each writer. Lastly, it endeavors to discover the teaching of each book in its entirety and also in its individuality. These points were touched upon in the opening of this section of the Introduction; they need to be treated rather more explicitly before we close because they enter into the more valuable characteristics of the Expositor's Bible.

      The application of this new method of Biblical Theology to the New Testament has been delightfully fruitful in results. First and foremost come the studies in the teachings of Jesus with which the Christian thought of our age has been revivified. The now familiar phrase "back to Christ" has been nowhere better illustrated than in the course of these studies. It has now become possible to know to a considerable extent what was the actual teaching of the Master detached from the subsequent teaching of the disciples; and such knowledge must be welcomed as of supreme importance even if we allow that the disciples were authorized and inspired teachers commissioned by Christ Himself to carry on the revelation of Christian truth by means of the illumination of the Holy Spirit with which they were endowed. Every loyal servant of Christ must attach primary importance to the position, the action, the sufferings and the very words of his Lord and Master. The teachings of Jesus form the most valuable part of every book that deals at all adequately with New Testament Theology as a whole;67 but they are also discussed in works wholly devoted to this great subject.68 One interesting report which has been brought out with peculiar force both by Beyschlag and by Wendt is the essential harmony between our Lord's teaching in the synoptic gospels and that in John. Special attention has lately been given the teaching of Christ about Himself, and in particular to the meaning of the title, "the Son of Man."69 There has also been much discussion about the teaching of Jesus in the gospels concerning the last things, and Dr. Charles, the greatest authority on this subject, has set forth the view that Jewish eschatological notions are here blended with the original teachings of Jesus, while others think that our Lord's teachings about the Destruction of Jerusalem have been confused with His teachings about the end of the world and the final judgment.70

      The teachings of St. Paul, the greatest theologian of the primitive church, and indeed of all ages, have received searching investigation during recent years. They are discussed with much fullness in the books on New Testament Theology as a whole that have been already referred to; and valuable works have been devoted to the exclusive study of them.

Скачать книгу