The Holy Scriptures - The Canon and Inspiration
by A. A. Hodge
Part I
LET us now consider the Bible, its genesis and its inspiration. The word "Bible" means book; the word "Scripture" means writing; and it is by the common consent of men that these words are applied to this one subject, because it is a book of books, and because, beyond all comparison, it is the Writing of writings. It is the most important of all books, because, as a matter of historical fact, this book, more than any other force, has molded the character of the great nations of the world and given birth to what we call the modern or Western civilization; because all historic Churches, with one accord, declare it to be the foundation of their creeds - declare that this book is the Word of God; because, in spite of all our divisions, the whole Church really accepts this book as the only infallible and divinely authoritative rule of our faith and practice; and because it is, between all Christians, the standard of appeal on all subjects of debate, the only common ground upon which we stand, the only court of last resort.
II. On what presuppositions does our doctrine rest? In every problem there are two elements - the a priori element of principle and the a posteriori element of fact. To this there is no exception in any of the problems of philosophy or of science or of theology. The a priori question of principle must be taken first, and will condition the whole argument. We must, before we take up the subject of the Bible, first take up the questions: Is there a God? Does he exist? What relation does he sustain to the universe? Can he reveal himself to man? Has he made a revelation of himself to man? Are men capable of receiving a divine revelation through the means of a book?
Now, it is held, on the basis of all the presuppositions of atheism, of materialism, of agnosticism, and even of the old deism, that it is absolutely absurd to talk of any supernatural revelation of God, or of any Bible as either containing or being the Word of God. I want, however, to assure the laymen who have not investigated these questions, that nine-tenths of all the objections which men are making now to the Scriptures, in which they claim that the progress of knowledge, the progress of civilization, the progress of science, the progress of critical investigation, the vast aggregate of historical knowledge, all are sweeping away the foundations of our ancient faith in the Bible - I wish to assure them that these objections are totally untrue. Those that are made are not founded upon facts, but simply upon a priori philosophical principles. Neither science nor history nor criticism bears any testimony against the divine origin of the Bible. I appeal with confidence to the a priori principles of a contrary philosophy. We must meet them on their own ground, and appeal from the postulates of a false philosophy to the postulates of a true. We have as much right to believe our philosophy as they have to believe theirs. Renan, for instance, begins his discussion upon the Epistles with this assumption: "The supernatural is impossible;" therefore the supernatural is unhistorical, and therefore any piece of literature that claims to convey to us supernatural information must so far forth be incorrect and be the subject of correction by critical hands.
You see that this is a mere assumption, and the whole principle on which it rests is that which underlies the philosophy, atheistic, materialistic, agnostic, or deistic, of these errorists; and if this be swept away, not only all the foundations for such a claim, but all color of presumption on which it rests, is swept away at once. Doubtless there are very many men of great ability who are perfectly honest who hold to this belief. They are thoroughly convinced of the principles of their a priori philosophy, and these principles are evidently inconsistent with the truths of Christianity.
But if we discard the unproved assumptions, we invalidate their conclusions. There are others who ought to be treated kindly: they are thoroughly convinced, but they are half-educated, timid souls who are confused in this babel of tongues, and who do not know the deceitfulness of materialistic belief - who are inclined to believe in the ancient faith, but are also under pressure from the arrogant claims of philosophy. For such we must have great consideration, and instead of repelling them by words, draw them to us by the spirit of Christ, and by showing that we not only believe intellectually, but that we have a ground of assurance in our inward experience, in the testimony of the Holy Ghost, which must excite respect and confidence in them.
Now, in beginning this argument, I wish to claim, first, the truth of all I have said in the three preceding lectures. You see, therefore, the logical reason for the order I adopted. I claim, as preliminary to the discussion of the doctrine of Holy Scripture, the truths of the principles already established: to wit, there is a God; this God possesses the attributes of omnipresence, omnipotence, infinitude, etc.; he is everywhere present; immanent in all things at all times; working continuously and universally through all things from within. He is also transcendent and extramundane, acting upon the world from without on such points and at such times as he wills. The whole order of providence and of moral government, whether natural, supernatural, or gracious, is presupposed in this argument.
If a man does not believe in God as omnipresent and as active in all his creatures, if he does not believe that man is a free moral agent under the moral government of God, who is a holy, just, and benevolent Ruler, then this lecture is not intended for him. But if a man does so believe, we challenge him to present objections to the catholic doctrine of the Word of God which will be at the same time rational and consistent with Christian Theism.
III. How do we ascertain the Constituent, Parts of Scripture? - that is, how do we (1) ascertain the several books which make up the canon? and (2) how do we ascertain the words which make up the correct text of those books? I can of course attempt only a very bare sketch of what should be the full and critically-learned answer to these questions. You all fully understand that they fall outside of the particular department of study to which my life has been devoted. The amount of the highest talent and learning consecrated within the Christian Church to the defense and elucidation of the sacred Scriptures would infinitely surprise the shallow critics who are vociferously claiming that its pretensions have been disproved. They should remember that a few frogs in a swamp make incomparably more noise than all the herds of cattle browsing upon a hundred hills. Yet none are deceived, except the frogs themselves. In Princeton Theological Seminary the study of the subjects embraced within this single lecture consumes the larger part of three years of study, and the entire attention of four learned and able professors.
(A) 1. How do we ascertain what Books constitute the Canon of the Old Testament? The New Testament came into existence in an age in which a contemporaneous literature existed, thoroughly illuminated by the light of history. But the Old Testament contains the very oldest extant literature of the world. It inaugurates human history, and therefore cannot, in its earliest contents, be verified by contemporaneous testimonies. It is only in its later periods that it receives confirmation unquestionable from the monuments of Egypt and the cylinders of Assyria.
Nevertheless, we are certain that we have the very same canon which Christ recognized when he said to his disciples and through them to us, "Search the Scriptures: ......they are they which testify of me." The very books which we have now are the very books to which Christ appealed. He cited them (1) by their classes, as "the Law," "the Law and the Prophets;" and (2) he quoted the writings severally, and attributed them to their respective authors - as to Moses, to David, and to Esaias. The same was done by the inspired writers of the New Testament. That the canon endorsed by Christ is the very canon we now possess we know to an absolute certainty - by the Septuagint translation, made nearly three hundred years before Christ; by the Hebrew Bible, jealously guarded by the Jews from the earliest ages to the present time; from the testimony of Philo and of Josephus, the great Jewish writers of the first Christian century; and from the earliest Latin and Syriac translations.
As to this point, indeed, there is no controversy. The simple question remains, which to real Christians is no question, whether the testimony of Christ our Lord is sufficient to establish the fact.
2. How do we ascertain the True Text of the Several Books which constitute this Canon? Our reliance here also is upon the guarantee of Christ. We are sure that we possess the Masoretic text which was collected and recorded by the Masorets from the fifth century onward. These were great Jewish scholars, who searched all manuscripts open to them, not to form a new text, but to ascertain the true text in the material that had descended to them. The Targums and the Talmud also make it certain that the text we now have is essentially the identical text which Christ had, and which he virtually guarantees to us. The same fact is proved to us by the Septuagint Greek Version before referred to, and by the Peshito, the old Syriac Version, made at the end of the second century. The Septuagint, the Hebrew Bible, the Syriac Version, the Vulgate, the Masoretic notes must embody the text as it existed in the time of Christ. The agreement of all the various sources of information is so close that the greatest differences they suggest would not change a single doctrine nor cast doubt upon a single historic fact of any importance. I am justified, therefore, in affirming that we stand possessed today of the very same Old Testament Scriptures to which Christ appealed, and to which his authority binds our obedience and our faith.
In these days you hear much of the ravages which a learned criticism has made in the integrity of our traditional Scriptures, and thus in the historical foundations of our faith. Ordinary historical criticism is a perfectly legitimate and necessary process by which all the light, external and internal, afforded by history, literature, and the intrinsic characteristics of the books or texts in question is collected, and we judge by means of all the best evidence we have what conclusions we have to draw in reference to their genuineness and their integrity, or the reverse. But there is an arrogant phase of the "higher criticism" that is far more ambitious, and attempts to correct, or even to reconstruct, the existing text by wide inductions from the history of the times, from the other writings, and from the known or supposed character, knowledge, style, situation, or subject of the writer. The whole historical situation is vividly conceived by the critic of this school, and he proceeds to infer therefrom what the writer must have said or could not have said. It is admitted that in some cases and within narrow limits such a process may be legitimate. When there is conflict or indefiniteness in the evidence afforded by direct explicit historical data of manuscript or version, it may be well to go further afield for collateral or for inferential evidence. But it is very plain that this process of "higher criticism" is liable to be colored, and even wholly controlled, by the subjective conditions of the critic - by his sympathies, by his historical and philosophical and religious theories, and by his a priori judgments as to what the sacred writer ought to say. It is also very plain that the conclusions of this Criticism are of no value whatever when opposed to clearly ascertained historical facts or documentary evidence.
In the case of "criticism" applied to the Old or New Testament Scriptures in a spirit hostile to the long-received faith of the Christian Church, it is notorious that it is the outgrowth of a false philosophy, of naturalistic views of God's relation to the world, and of a priori theories of evolution applied to history. When we remember, therefore, what can be clearly proved by historic fact and document, that Christ endorsed as the Word of God the very Old Testament Scriptures, book and text, which we now possess, when we remember that all the evidence attainable from Egyptian monuments and Assyrian cylinders corroborates the claims of this Hebrew Bible in all its parts, it is very evident that the claims of this "criticism" are groundless.
(B) 1. How do we ascertain what Books of right belong to the New Testament Canon? Here the case is different. Christ did not present us the collected books of the New Testament and guarantee their integrity. On the other hand, these books were written in the full light of an historically illuminated age, and come to us supported by a contemporaneous literature and followed by a copious consequent literature of their own creating.
The rule by which the canonicity of any New Testament book is determined is: any book written by an apostle, or received generally as canonical by the Church during the age in which it was presided over and instructed by the apostles, is to be regarded as canonical. Take, for instance, the Epistle to the Hebrews. If written by Paul, then it would have a right to a place in the canon for that reason. But if not written by Paul, if it was received generally as canonical by the Church during the lives of Paul and John, then its right must be admitted on that ground.
Of course, the facts in question must be determined by an examination of two classes of evidence - (1) the internal character of the writing; (2) the external historical evidence of its genuineness and of its recognition as canonical by the Church of the first century. No external evidence can prove a book to have come from God if its contents are morally bad or intellectually contemptible. Nevertheless, no matter what the contents of a book may be, we cannot admit that it belongs to the New Testament canon except on the ground of explicit and sufficient historical proof.
The kind of evidence by which we establish the canonicity of each of the books of the New Testament is precisely the same as that by which we prove the authenticity and genuineness of any ancient classic. The only difference is that in behalf of the books of the New Testament the evidence is incomparably more abundant. This evidence may be distributed under the following heads, each head representing copious literatures critically sifted and logically arranged - (1) quotations and references to these books found in the writings of early Christians; (2.) early catalogues of the sacred books; (3) early translations; (4) general verdict of the Church; (5) internal characteristics.
You hear a great deal today about the "Christian consciousness." The new critics, having destroyed the ancient historical foundations of our Scriptures and of our faith, wish now to build them up again upon a basis of Christian consciousness. Every book and every specific reading is to be received which is approved by the subjective tests, literary, scientific, aesthetic, religious, and fantastic, of self-appointed Scripture-tasters in the nineteenth century. We also believe in a Christian consciousness - that is, in a human consciousness modified by religious experience and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. But the mouthpiece of that consciousness is no self-appointed, self-conscious group of cultured moderns. It is voiced only by the consensus of all Christians of all nations, all ecclesiastical folds and ages. These very critics deny the growth of the whole Church since St. Augustine, because its uniform testimonies rebuke them. We, on the contrary, appeal from the self-elected representatives of "Christian consciousness" to the thing itself - to the consensus of the whole Church, ancient, mediaeval, and modern, Greek, Roman, Lutheran, and Reformed. We appeal to the historic and abiding creeds, confessions, hymns, and liturgies of all Christians. We appeal to the testimony of the Holy Ghost, to the witness of all saints and martyrs, to all reformations, revivals, and missions since Pentecost.
The progress of this controversy has been one unbroken march of triumph for the integrity of our traditional canon. The first destructive "critics" denied the authenticity and historic validity of the fourth Gospel, and the originality and accuracy of the synoptic Gospels; and they admitted the genuineness of only four books - Romans, First and Second Corinthians, and Galatians. These are admitted to have been the genuine writings of the apostle Paul by the general consent of the most destructive critics, and of all branches and ages of the Christian Church. This admission alone defeats the enemy, and establishes upon this rock of unquestionable historic fact the whole gospel system. The entire body of Christian doctrine can be shown to be taught in these four admitted original Christian documents - the entire person, office, and work of Christ; the entire salvation, temporal and eternal, of his believing followers. Since that time the originality and validity of the synoptical Gospels have been fully vindicated, and the genuineness of the fourth Gospel has been established beyond reasonable question, as is nobly admitted and maintained by the late Dr. Ezra Abbot, one of the most learned Unitarians America has ever produced.
2. How do we ascertain the True text of the Several Books of the New Testament? You can easily understand that through the process of multiplying manuscripts by hand, which is laborious and involves an infinitude of independent details, an untold number of variations would creep into the text.
The textus receptus was formed in the age of the Reformation by a hasty and uncritical gathering and comparison of the manuscripts which were found lying ready to hand, without respect to their various age or authority. Cardinal Ximenes, in Complutum, Spain, printed the first edition, A.D. 1514, which, however, was not published till 1520 or 1521. The next edition was issued by Erasmus from Bale, 1516, with succeeding editions of 1519, 1522, 1527, 1535; then that of Stephanus from Paris, 1546; then that of Beza from Geneva, 1565. Finally, the second Elzevir edition of 1633, Leyden, which claimed to give the textus receptus, was generally so received, and gave currency to that title. The text thus formed was the basis of the English version of King James and of all the New Testaments of all languages in modern times.
But during the present century the text of the New Testament has been carefully studied, a far wider collection of manuscripts has been gathered, the more ancient and valuable manuscripts have been made the basis of a corrected text, and a text nearly approximating to the original autographs of the sacred writers has been arrived at by a process of critical comparison and judgment of the immense material collected.
This is gathered - (1.) From ancient manuscripts: for example, the Codex Alexandrinus in the British Museum, dating from the beginning of the fifth century from 400 to 450, after the birth of Christ; the Cortex Vaticanus, dating from some time in the fourth century; the Codex Sinaiticus, believed by Tischendorf to be one of the fifty copies prepared by the order of Constantine by Eusebius, A.D. 381. (2.) From the numerous quotations from the New Testament writings found in the works of the early Fathers. (3.) From the early translations, such as the Peshito, or early Syriac, latter part of the second century; the Latin Vulgate of Jerome, A.D. 385; the Coptic, from the third century. From all these sources the new critical-editions of the New Testament Greek text have been derived. The best of these in their order have been those of Griesbach, who died 1812; Lachuiann, who died 1851; Tischendorf, who died 1874; andl of Westcott and Hort, which was made the basis of the New Revision in 1880.
This much has been settled upon definite and sufficient historical evidence critically sifted. The testimony establishes the fact that these New Testament books constitute the second division of God's Word, and that the text in our possession is incomparably more accurate and more certain than that which is possessed of any other ancient book in the world. God has taken such care of his own Word that the differences which you may observe between the Revised Version and the Old Version of the Scriptures are such as do not involve the stability of a single important historic fact, or of a single article of faith. We are brought by this process not only to the substance, but to the form and shading, of the truth as it came from the original organs of revelation. We can almost recognize the tone and inflection of the voice of Christ himself.