implies such a divine influence as employs man's faculties according to their natural laws." "Man is not considered as being in any sense the cause or originator of the revelation of which God alone is the source, but human agency is regarded as the condition under which the revelation becomes known to others. ..... From this view, then, it results that that peculiar natural type according to which each sacred writer was moulded at his creation was assimilated, as it were, by the power of inspiration, and appropriated by the Spirit; while, at the same time, the spiritual influence is no more to be confounded with the tokens of individual character than it is to be identified with the esssence of natural life. In short, the divine and human elements, mutually interpenetrating and combined, form one vital, organic whole not mechanically, still less ideally, but, as it has been termed, dynamically, united."1 Secondly, the objection from the various forms in which the same words of our Lord are recorded by different evangelists. The narrative of the storm on the Sea of Galilee furnishes a familiar illustration of this, and one which has been used with great effect by the opponents of the mechanical theory now under consideration. According to Matthew, the disciples awaken their Master with the words: "Lord, save us; we perish"; and he rebukes their unbelief with the words: "Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?" 2 According to Mark, the prayer is: "Master (didáσкaλe), carest thou not that we perish?" and the reply is: "Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have not faith?" 8 According to Luke, they come to him with the cry: "Master, Master (éπioтára, éπioтáтα), we perish"; and he answers: "Where is your faith?" The hypothesis resorted to by some, of appeals to the Master by different disciples, receiving each of them different answers, is too unnatural and far-fetched to be received by a candid interpreter of God's word; and, moreover, if admitted here, it would not be 1 The Inspiration of Scripture, p. 39. 8 Mark iv. 38-40. 2 Matt. viii. 25, 26. 4 Luke viii. 24, 25. 1 available throughout the Gospels as a general principle of harmonizing. The advocates of verbal inspiration in the narrowest sense admit the variety of record here referred to, and vindicate it "from the practice of history, from the practice of witnesses in delivering evidence in courts of judicature, and from common practice in the hourly occurrences of social life." But they ascribe it, of course, to the immediate dictation of the Divine Spirit. "The formulas," says Carson (with reference to another case), "certainly imply that God communicated in words; but they do not necessarily imply that the speaker's communication is verbally identical with the written account of it. The Holy Spirit, in recording the spoken communication, might use that variety of expression that truth permits to all human writers."2 Very true. The Holy Spirit might do this; but on what ground? Obviously on the ground that the concern of the Divine Spirit is not about particular phrases and forms of words, but about the substance of the truth recorded. It is not, in his view, essential that a narrative should be expressed in just such words; consequently, it is not necessary that the words of the sacred penman should be inspired into his mind in such a sense that no liberty of choice, no agency of selection is left to him. If he be so illuminated from above as to comprehend fully the truth to be stated, he may then express it in the free exercise of his own faculties, and in his own style and manner. This view alone is in harmony with the universal law of the divine operations, and in it we find a reasonable explanation of the freedom and variety employed by the different evangelists in recording the words of our Lord. God had endowed each of them with peculiar gifts. The Holy Spirit did not supersede these, nor simply imitate them; but he used them in reality, not in empty show. Hence not only the variety of style and manner employed by the evangelists, but also the variety in their ways of looking at a given transaction and of making a record of it. This truth Augustine saw and clearly ex1 Carson's Refutation of Dr. Henderson, p. 124. 2 Ibid. p. 127. pressed in his well-known remarks on the narrative of the storm on the sea of Galilee, giving, at the same time, the mechanical mode of harmonizing above referred to. 66 It is," says he," one and the same thought on the part of those who awaken the Lord and desire to be saved. Nor is it necessary to inquire which of these expressions, rather than the other, was addressed to Christ. For, whether they uttered some one of these three, or other words which no one of the evangelists has recorded, but which, nevertheless, had the same purport so far as the truth of the thought is concerned, what difference does it make?"1 Inspiration in its Relation to Versions. We have seen that inspiration lies not in the particular order and arrangement of the words, but in the substance. of the thoughts which they express. It is a vital power, pervading and animating every part of scripture, as the blood does the human body. It follows that, just so far as versions express the true sense of the original text, its inspiration passes over into them. Versions are inferior in authority to the original Hebrew and Greek, simply because we cannot be certain that the men by whom they were executed always apprehended fully and expressed adequately the meaning of the original text. But we must not allow errors, or the suspicion of errors, in particular cases, to set aside their divine authority. The poorest version current in any Christian community gives all the doctrines and duties of revealed religion in clear and unambiguous terms. In this or that particular instance, we may doubt whether the translator has given the true meaning; but we are sure that the version presents to the view of its readers the same God and Father of all, the same Lord Jesus, the same Holy Spirit, the same way of salvation through the blood of atonement, the same conditions of faith and repentance, the same doctrine which is according to godliness, the same heaven, and the same hell. Its "Thus saith the Lord" comes to 1 De Consensu Evv. ii. 24. See further in Appendix, Note C. the consciences of its readers with divine authority; and he who rejects it, rejects not the word of man, but the word of God. If he who uses the version cannot know that every particular passage is correctly translated, so neither can he who reads the original be confident that in every particular passage he apprehends its true meaning. But in both cases the way of salvation by grace shines forth in all its parts with the clearness of the unclouded sun at noon. In this respect the vision is written so plainly "that he may run that readeth it." General Remark. In considering the question of the mode of inspiration, we have designedly avoided giving prominence to the distinctions of" divine excitement," "invigoration," "superintendence," and "guidance," etc., not because these have not, partly, at least, a foundation in reality; but because, like the colors of the rainbow, they blend together so intimately that the attempt to separate them into so many different and distinct forms of inspiration becomes a very difficult undertaking. Nor is this analysis necessary. It is enough to say that whatever revelations of new truth were needed, the Holy Spirit gave in such forms and modes as seemed good to him; that whatever help was required to secure a record of truths already known that should be true and faithful according to his will, this also was granted; and that in all cases the Divine Spirit worked in the minds of the inspired writers in perfect harmony with the constitution which they had by nature; so that, under his supernatural influence, they freely used all their faculties, not in appearance, but in reality. APPENDIX The question of the possibility of such communications as we are considering "becoming matters of distinct consciousness on the part of those to whom they were made," is discussed by Henderson.' Its importance, he justly remarks, "will at once appear, when it is considered that in all 1 Henderson on Divine Inspiration, pp. 65-70. Edition of 1847. ages there have been those who have themselves been persuaded, and who have endeavored to persuade others, that they were subjects of immediate inspiration, while nothing can be more satisfactorily made out than the fact of their self-deception and the utter nullity of their pretended supernatural intercourse with the Deity." He further adds: "The modus, however, of that consciousness which they [the true prophets] possessed of inspiration is a psychological question, which is fraught with no small difficulty; and it may be anticipated that all who have given the subject a reasonable degree of attention will concur in considering it to be one of which the absolute determination lies entirely beyond the power of those who have never had any personal experience of such consciousness.” We think that in this remark Henderson has truth and reason on his side. It is important, however, to notice, as he does, "the fact of the original legitimation of the prophets and apostles by the intervention of miraculous agency visibly and uncontrollably displayed." As examples of such "original legitimation," we may specify the cases of Moses,' of Samuel,' of Isaiah,3 of Jeremiah,* of Ezekiel," and, in an emphatic sense, of all the apostles, who were directly called by Christ himself, and by him endowed with miraculous gifts, "by means of which a perfect assurance must have rested upon the minds of these holy men that they were actually employed by the Deity as the instruments of communicating to mankind the knowledge of truths otherwise undiscoverable by them." To the recipients themselves it was not necessary that this outward miraculous certification should be repeated in the case of each particular communication. They recognized God's presence, as already remarked, by a supernatural intuition. For those whom they addressed an outward supernatural attestation of their divine commission was necessary at the beginning - necessary, certainly, in all cases where new revelations were added to those previously made; and such an attestation was given by God in the case of even our Lord, to which he often referred his hearers. But when once clearly made, it needed not constant repetition. Moses, for example, having been miraculously attested at the beginning of his mission, could speak to the people ever afterwards with divine authority. So, too, it was unreasonable in the Scribes and Pharisees to ask of our Lord a sign from heaven as the seal of his commission, for this seal had already been given. It is not unreasonable, however, that we should demand of one who professes to come with new revelations from God, or to speak with divine authority as an interpreter of God's word, that he do what the prophets and apostles and Christ himself did — give us in an unmistakable form the credentials of his alleged divine commission. Otherwise, we open a wide door to the two twin vices of unconscious self-delusion and conscious imposture. 1 Ex. iii. seq. 21 Sam. iii. Isa. vi.; though there is some doubt whether the vision recorded in this chapter took place at the beginning of Isaiah's prophetical office. • Jer. i. Ezek. i. and viii. sq. 6 John v. 36; x. 25, 38; xv. 24. |