The Bible and Life

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strongest nations selected it for their inspiration and guidance, that fact is significant. If, on the other hand, the Bible has trained the strongest nations

lato and become the evangel of Socrates' splendid wisdom? Why did it elect one particular volume? And what would have been the effect on its own life if it had chosen some other book? Would the writings of Marcus Aurelius or of Seneca, with their high moral grade and their m

greatest worker in those lands where it has been set free to yield its own message? What is the peculiar quality in the Book that has saved any theory of its authority from appearing absurd? The Bible showed its power long before men adopted any theory of its power. Doubtless the claim of authority has increa

t is a brief Book, yet out of its small compass men gather texts for fifty years of preaching and at the close of their life's task feel that the pages are still exhaustless. The Bible has inspired literature far beyond its own bulk. It is a smal

Bible. The books that were written as contemporaries of parts of the great Book have either slipped into oblivion or are known to-day only by the intellectually elect. The classics are studied by a small circle of scholars. The average man knows nothing of Virgil, or Cicero, or Homer, by any direct contact with the works of those authors. But the Bible, which is out of date by the calendar, is not out of date by its own meaning. It is singularly contemporaneous. Its different portions were called forth by passing events and the

vince which was smaller than many a modern county. The customs of which it tells are mostly gone. Sandals and tents and camels and parchments are curiosities in the new lands and new times. Much of the sett

cramped geography, its vivid Orientalism, the B

hs and widths of sidewalks and streets; the figures of population; the social status of the various groups-all this may be told with exact and mathematical truthfulness. It may be correct and still not be inspired or inspiring. On the other hand, the parable of the prodigal son is a story which in its precise detail may represent something that never occurred. But it has impressed the world as both inspired and inspiring. Its words haunt and pierce and coax and subdue men. This indicates that a story given for a spirit

mon. The story is as follows: A heavenly visitant appeared to Joseph Smith and told him that in a certain place he would find the miracle book. Smith obeyed the directions and found in the place named a box of stone. In this box was a volume half a foot in thickness. It was written on thin plates of gold, and these plates were bound together by gold rings. The writing was in a strange language, but with the book was found a pair of miraculous eyeglasses which confer

ct that it is not an abnormal book, fantastically given to men. There is a humorous story of an old woman who was discovered in diligent study of the Hebrew alphabet. Asked why at her age she was beginning to learn so difficult a tongue, she made reply that when she died she desired to address the Almighty in his own language! There have been theories of the Bible that are scarcely caricatured by this t

t. Genesis treats of the origins of the earth and of man, and is an answer to the inevitable question that springs in the human mind. Exodus treats of the going forth of the Hebrew people from their Egyptian bondage. Leviticus is a description and dis

ather the general descriptions of life itself as it moved along a period of seven or eight centuries. They give us the salient and meaningful happenings among God's chosen people. They tell the story of a crude race as it is being led forward to the heights. The pages record limitations and faults simply because they tell us of actual life. The sins of the

reality. They declared that God hated all pretense. New moons and feasts and fasts that did not grow out of devout hearts they declared to be an insult and an abomination before a righteous God. They talked from life to life. They came in response to some human demand in their times. They were not theorists, discussing academic problems of conduct. They were blazing moral realists. We do not need to detail the list of those forthtellers of the Word of God. Even the book of Jonah is full of life. Parable, allegory, history-its descriptions are based in life and its appeal is

a psalm is penned. The ark is moved from one place to another; a psalm is written. A man is jaded and discouraged; a psalm is written to recover him to a consciousness of the care of Jehovah. A monarch falls into grievous sin; a psalm is written to express his penitence. A study of any Commentary on the

ways come first. This phase will be treated later. Now it must be emphasized that the entire New Testament sprang from a Life that was lived among men. The Word must become flesh be

s to the Thessalonians seek to produce a right attitude toward the doctrine of the Lord's return. The Epistle to the Romans is a discussion of the doctrine of justification by faith and the relations of that doctrine to Judaism. That to the Galatians is both a personal defense of Paul's questioned apostleship and a declaration of freedom from bondage to the law. The Philippians grew out of an experience of human kindness

breathes in the letter which Onesimus carried back with him to his former master. Titus and Timothy are the pastoral advices sent by the aged apostle to his younger sons in the faith, while one of the Epistles is the hopeful farewell to earth and a glad trust toward the Eternal City. Rev

s, God met the need by the message that he gave to his servants. The Book is not a series of infallible abstractions; it is rather a vital Guide Book won from the experience of life's ways. The Bible is not a ready-made product dropped down from heaven; it is rather a Library made by men i

book. The only volumes worth while are those that grow out of your deepest life." The advice was good. In a way it suggests the manner of the Bible's making. There is no evidence whatsoever that any writer of its pages ever thought that his work would become part of a Bible. No man ever said, "I will now write a book of the Holy Scripture." Nor did any group of men assign departments to each other, saying, "We will prepare a divine B

nce was in session. The year was 325 A. D. While man wondered and questioned, God settled the issue. Suddenly the genuine books were lifted from the mass of volumes and, without visible power, lay on the sacred table. The writings miraculously declared uncanonical remained beneath the altar. This theory of selection corresponds to the theory of dictation. We have in both cases an active God and a passive man. While it would be unfair t

of the church. Now while something of this kind did occur, it is far from the truth to affirm that the councils lacked a representative capacity. The vote may have been recorded by theologians, but the vote had previously been determined by the Christian democracy. Abraham Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation. His predecessors were the people. In a dignified sense Lincoln was their clerk, expressing their will after many years of ag

ynagogue which continued for not less than two hundred years and which in that period finished the collection and authorization of the Old Testament. This synagogue had various presidents, including Nehemiah. No such organization fo

e pages. He is made to feel how far he and his people have gone from the will of Jehovah. He rends his clothes. He sends for the human voices of the Most High. Huldah, the prophetess, is the chief instructor. The people are called back to their allegiance. The land is purged. A manuscript has done all this. It inspired the king and his people

sing of the multitude were gaining for themselves the popular vote. Candidates for the canon were rejected. Other candidates were held in long suspicion. Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, Esther, Solomon's Song-all these served a long probation ere they proved themselves worthy of their place. The ancient world, like the modern world, was not w

h had decided what books should go into the canon and that Luther must accept a quotation from Second Maccabees as authoritative, the great Reformer made reply, "The church cannot give more authority or force to a book than it has in itself. A council cannot make that be Scripture which in its own nature is not Scripture." So it came to pass that in due season

ion, because they had received Christ. But the Gospels and Epistles which grew up out of life had in their turn to be tested by life. Believers began by reading these as if they were suggestive; after the writings had wrought their full impression upon the minds of the believers, they began to consider them inspired and holy. This decision did not come abstractly, nor did it come quickly. Gradually the sense of the value of certai

r lists which show some of our present books omitted, some other books included, and still other books declared as good but inferior. The Christian consciousness had not yet reached a confident verdict. But a review of the period shows the Christian leaders verging toward unanimity. Slowly some books were eliminated; and slowly other books asserted their right to be included. By the beginning of the fifth century the

e. He felt that the vivid practicalness of James conflicted with the principle of justification by faith alone. It is only a stronger evidence of the demands of life in the selection of the final canon that even the powerful influence of Luther could not prevail. The church well knew that the Epistle of James would be a good antidote for any lazy mysticism. Life voted against Luther in this instance, and life won. Zwingli wanted to exclude t

ex allegory or symbol relating to Christ and the church. All labored attempts to so construe the book did the book itself injury. But when the Song was permitted to recover its own relation to life, it recovered its own power. The lesson of the book, rightly used, may save many young women from selling themselves to lascivious luxury and may give t

goal; and the goal is Christ. Other sacred books, such as the Koran, were written by one person; the Bible was written by many persons for one Person. Jesus himself insisted on this. He claimed to surpass the old revelations. With all his reverence for the Old Testament, he still put himself above it by words like these: "Ye have heard that it hath been said by them of olden time, But I say unto you." This is as much as to affirm th

ot be denied. But we may confidently assert that revelation came to its culmination and crown in Jesus Christ. When once the essential things concerning him had found place in a Book, the Bible found its consummation. Thus do we see that the books that were written by li

and silly, but even hideous and repellent." Of the Brahmanas he affirms that they "deserve to be studied as the physician studies the twaddle of idiots and the ravings of madmen." The Koran sets forth a very fine morality, but it was written by one man and really presents a legal religion. Moreover it offers no perfect example. The author of the Koran himself claimed to receive revelations that opened a path to immorality. One voice de

men may adopt as to its formation. It creates its own evidences. The argument for its inspiration is the life that it inspires. If the Book gives power and purity to all departments of life, the Book defends itself against attack and makes its o

alms of human experience. More and more the students of the Holy Scriptures, who seek the pages with a religious purpose, will find that all the departments of human living wait on Jesus for their meaning and come to him for their power. He is the Saviour. He lifts men out of their sins, up into a trembling and glorious idealism, and still up into a passion for