ARTICLE IV.

THE COMPARATIVE VALUE OF ENGLISH AND GERMAN BIBLICAL SCIENCE.

By Charles A. Aiken, Resident Licentiate, Andover.

BIBLICAL SCIENCE is one of the legitimate fruits of Protestantism. The necessity of any high development of sacred learning will be practically conceded only where a free Bible is given to the people. Accordingly the world owes to Protestantism not merely a free Bible for all classes, but the cultivation of those means which shall open to any class a profound insight into the meaning of the Scriptures. Withhold the Bible from all but a small privileged order, and you remove, in great measure, the stimulus which shall impel the few to seek acquaintance with the import of the Bible. Why else have the monasteries in which was treasured all the learning of the dark ages, sacred and secular, preserved for us only such scanty and withered fruit? But Protestantism having given the world a Bible is under twofold obligation to make the gift available. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the great interpreter, it must seek to make the Scriptures intelligible to the masses; and, by teaching the true meaning and the right use of its gift, it must guard against perversions and abuses otherwise inevitable.

Then the church of Rome has ever relied less on the living word than on institutions and ordinances, which, apart from the word, are dead. Sacred science knows no more deadly foe than the spirit of Ritualism, under whatever ecclesiastical form it lurks. The Romish church is right in ascribing great efficacy to its forms and sacraments; but as mere forms, forsaken by the indwelling Spirit working in and with the word, they are efficacious only of evil. If this church has at any time put forth an effort to make the Scriptures more intelligible, it has been under the constraint of external pressure. In self-defence, or to maintain her self-respect and justify herself before an enlightened age, she must needs seem zealous for the promotion of an intelligent faith and a consecrated learning. But enthusiasm and proficiency in Biblical studies have always been an occasion of suspicion and jealousy at the Vatican.

Yet, for the services that Catholicism has reluctantly found herself compelled to render to Biblical learning, we tender grateful acknowledgment. We would not depreciate by a single iota the true merits of Valla and Erasmus, Simon and Calmet, Hou bigant and De Rossi, Hug, Jahn and Van Ess. But if men like Mai and Mezzofanti had been Protestants, would not their prodigious learning have brought the cause of Christ more profit? And for our teachers in Biblical science must we not look, not merely of choice but of necessity, mainly to Protestant lands, and to Germany and England as chief seats of Protestant learning? The German and English language and literature were earliest consecrated by the Reformation, and the genius of Protestantism has ever found them most congenial.

It is proposed to inquire into the comparative value of English and German Biblical science. In defining our point of view we would guard against a twofold prejudice. The epithet "German," in any association with religion and theology, is received, by some good men among us, with the same shrug of the shoulders, which, it may be supposed, one might detect in a pious Jew when he heard the name of Nazareth. Others, as well meaning, deeply impressed by the superiority of German learning, and awed by the confidence with which Germans assume that "wisdom shall die with them," or, it may be, enamored of German liberality, quote German authorities as though that were decisive of all vexed questions. We need not profess to shun both these extremes, of superstitious antipathy and servile deference. We have to add, by way of explanation, only this, that we restrict the terms "Biblical science" to that department of theology whose province is to define and interpret God's written revelation.

It is worthy of remark, that the development of Biblical science has been for the last hundred years much more rapid in Germany than in England. Time was when Walton and Lightfoot and Mill and Usher and Selden were recognized authorities in their departments. But since their period few English names are to be found that are cited as authorities on the continent of Europe. The fact that there is no longer, as there then was, a common language for learned men, will in part account for the fact that the attention of continental scholars is so little called to the real merits of English Biblical literature. But must we not allow at least that we are no longer masters in this department of litera.

ture? Does not the prevailing style of our recent commentaries, for example, prove that Henry and Doddridge and Clarke and Owen still exhibit the fairest type of English exegesis? Whatever we have gained upon them, has been secured rather by appropriating and assimilating and correcting the results of German investigation than by original research. The impulse to the more important recent efforts of English Biblical scholars, has too manifestly come from Germany, to allow any denial that nart forgotten our former independence. Semler and Ernesti gave an impulse to Biblical studies in Germany to which no equivalent has been found in England.

It should further be observed, that Biblical criticism has been prosecuted most scientifically in Germany. True science loves order and method. Nowhere have the various departments of sacred science been so sharply defined, nowhere the prerogatives of each guarded with such jealous care as in Germany. The enthusiasm with which the general relations and proportions of science have been there discussed, has extended itself to the department of theology. We know of no good English work on what is called the methodology of the theological sciences, while in Germany this has become a distinct subject for the lectureroom, and a distinct department in literature. Practically we may be in the main following a just method, but this unconscious, unreasoning correctness should never claim the title of scientific accuracy.

The first problem to be solved by Biblical science respects the composition and history of the sacred canon. What are the constituent parts of the Bible, and how do these several parts authenticate their claim? What has been their history, severally and collectively? Then, what is the text of the Scriptures, and what is its import? What was the original record, what was its primitive intent, and what is its significance to us? The Romish church may seek an answer first and only through the answer to this other question, What has been the teaching of the church on these points? The church is thus exalted to sit in judgment on the word, rather than the word to be the judge of the church. But, as true Protestants, we protest against being bound by ecclesiastical tradition or any textus receptus. It may interest us, as a subject for historical inquiry, to learn the opinion of the church on these points. The concurrent opinion of great and good men may furnish us data or a valuable test for our own judgments.

And we may admit that a harmonious tradition establishes a presumption not easily overthrown, but we acknowledge no authority in human tradition. And the dictation of Protestant dogmatism is as irksome to us, and as baneful to true science, as any Romish assumption. We recognize as our competent teacher only the Holy Spirit, and claim to be, in our immediate responsibility to God, sole judges of the truth. We must think that Germany has been truor to this fundamental principle of Protestantism than England. Freedom and liberality of Christian science have been sadly cramped by the Romish affinities of the Anglican church. And English Calvinists have been slow to emulate Calvin in that free application of historical criticism to the Scriptures for which he was eminent above all the other reformers. That this should be the state of things in a church never more than half reformed, we can well understand; but that Calvinists should be so jealous of dissent from tradition admits of no justification. We apprehend that an examination of the literature of the Reformed and Lutheran churches on the continent, would show that the Lutherans, in respect to independence of religious inquiry, as in so many other particulars, are far more in sympathy with Romanism. In proportion to confidence in, and dependence on tradition, the necessity for and vigor of original research are diminished. The less intervention there is from whatever quarter between us, and the pure light of truth and the immediate teaching of the Holy Spirit, the clearer will be our discernment of the real form and substance of revelation. And we would protest against every view of the authority of the Scriptures, which would nullify that authority in case doubt be thrown on the correctness of the decisions of tradition. We refer mainly to discussions of the integrity, authorship, etc. of the sacred books. We may not be willing to go so far as Schleiermacher, and say "The Protestant church must claim to be still continually engaged in the more exact determination of the canon, and this is the highest problem for exegetical theology in the higher criticism." But we may never frown upon free investigation in this direction, unless we are willing to give ourselves up to be blinded and bound by tradition. The fact that Germany has exhibited lamentable instances of the abuse of this freedom, may admonish us to be cautious and circumspect. But it cannot forbid us the use of those means whose legitimate tendency is to define more clearly both the substance. and the import of the Scriptures.

Biblical science enters next upon the determination of the form of the sacred text. The "textus receptus" must furnish a basis for our investigations. But it may no more bind us than the decisions of tradition concerning the canon may in their sphere. In the prosecution of this investigation there are requisite the patience, and diligence, and enthusiasm in research for which German scholars are proverbial. This department of learned labor has been almost by common consent assigned to the Germans. They have, since the revival of classical studies among them, furnished the world with the texts of Greek and Roman authors. And in the department of oriental literature they must bring out of the undisturbed archives of English and continental libraries their manuscript treasures. The determination of the text of the original Scriptures demands the same qualifications, with the addition of a profounder reverence. Some critics, forgetting the solemnity of their work, have exhibited a disposition to play with the sacred text. This levity and licentiousness of criticism we would ever and only rebuke. A critic may easily shape a text so that everything difficult or obnoxious shall be removed, and the record shall no longer tell us what the writer said, but what the critic would have said in his circumstances. But one jealous both for the honor of God's word and the prerogatives of Christian science, will ask only, What was the original form of the revealed word? However we might wish to have the record read, research must tell us how it probably did read. There may be such a conflict of evidences that we can only approximate to a sure result. But this probable evidence is all that the case admits, and there is only the more need of impartiality and discrimination. No trivial reason shall lead us to alter the record, yet no prepossession shall make us obstinately tenacious of the received text. Regard for sound presumptions and the "analogy of faith," must keep in check irreverent criticism. It were a grave misdemeanor to tamper with the text of Greek and Roman classics; that misdemeanor becomes a crime of darkest hue, when the word of God is thus trifled with. Moral qualifications being supposed equal, we would not demur to that common consent which concedes to the Germans preeminent natural qualifications for this department of Scriptural criticism. And the fact that we have been content so long to rely on German texts, proves one of two things, that we are not competent to criticise the fidelity of