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A HANDBOOK OFCHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS


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STUDIES IN THEOLOGYB. JD. AXJQCANDBX, M-A* IXIXof larfy Ciiostianify*By S. ASCIIS, M.A., Ph-D.

History of the Stady of Theology, VoL IVoLELBy 1>r. C, A. BRICKS,The Christian Hope.By W. AI>AMS BK.QWN, Ph.D., IXIXCluistiamty and Social Questions-By WZM.IAM: CcrjcNiisrcBCAM, F.BÂ., D.The Justification, of God,By Rev, P. T. FQRSYXK.Christian Apologetics.By Rev, A. E, GAK.VIE.A Critical Iktrodtictioii to the OM Testament.By GEORGE BUCHANAIT GRATT, D.D., E>.li-tt.Gospel Origins.By WII-U^M WEST HOLDS-WORTH, M.A.Faith and Its Psychology.By WIXJLIAM R. IKGE, D.D.

By ROBERT MACKTJTTOSB:, >, >.Protestant Thouglit Before Kant.By A. CX McGiFFBRX, Ph.D^ I>.IXThe Theology of ttie Gospels.By JAJMES MO^FATT, D.I>. I>,Litt-HlstoTy of Christian Thought Since Kant.By EJDTÂRO CAU^VÊI-I, MOORE, X). U.The 3>octrine of the Atonement.By J. K. MOTLEY, M.A.Xtevelatioii and Inspiration*By JAMJES OUR, I>.D.A Critical Introduction to the T*ew Testament.By ARTHUR SAÎVKI^ PEAKE, IXD_Pttflosopiiy and Religion.By HASTINGS RASHIXAJLX,, D.LItt. COron.),(Durham), F.B.A.TheMoly Spirit.By T. REES, M.A. CLond.), B.A. (Oxon.)The ReHgiotis Ideas of the Old Testament.fly H- WHEE^KR R.OBIITSOK, M.A.Tbe Text and Canon of the New Testament.

By AlÊXANl>ER SOTJTER, D.LlttUChristian Thought to the Reformation,By HERBERT B. WOJUCMAW, IXUtt.Tne Tlieology of the Epistles.By BE. A. A, KKT^STKDY, I>.Sc., D.IXThe Pharisees and Jesus.By A, T. ROBERTSON, AJM., D.IX, IX.D.The Originality of the Christian Message.By H, It- MACKINTOSH, IXIX, T>JPML


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A HANDBOOK OFCHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS

BYALFRED ERNEST

ItA. (OXON.), JXD, (GLAS.)r OF raw COIABGE, UNIVERSITY or uornxm

AUTHOR OF *THK KITSOaLIAir THSOLOCTT,* *STUIOTS IK THU IKKSXLIFE OF JESUS/ *THK CHiEISTIAH CERTAXlfTY AMID

THBJ MODKXN PERPUEXITY,* 'STUDIES OFPAUL AND HIS GO5PKL, ETC.

NEW YORKCHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

1920


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TOSACKED 1DSH0BV OFEBWABD CAIBD, LL.D.

FBOTSSSOR or MOBAI, PHILOSOPHY IK GI^SGOWAND MASTEB OF ftAT.T.TAT. OOELEGE, OX3TOB&

This volume is dedicated in tokenof gratitude and reverence by oneof his students who, although ledto abandon his philosophy, yetcherishes his teaching as a most

precious possession.


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PREFACEIN the preparation of this volume the writer has aimed atjustifying the title by as complete an outline of the argu-ment for theChristian faith astheintellectual situationof to-day demands. This has necessitated the omission of minutediscussion ofmany of the topics. For the general characterof thetreatment compensation has been offeredin twoways :by reference to other volumes in this series dealing withsome of the subjects, or to other relevant writings, andby indicating when the writer himself has dealt with thesubject at greater length. The order of the chapters hasbeen determined with the view of exhibiting as far aspossible a continuous argument. In accordance with Msidea of the task of Apologetics as commendation ratherthan defence, less attention has been given to meetingobjections than to presenting the attractiveness of theChristian Gospel. The writer has not hesitated in statingconclusions reached by himself after much study -andthought, in the hope that they will be as helpful to othersas to himself. No attempt has been, or could be, made toindicate in every instance the source of arguments andsuggestions offered, as for the writer many have becomepart of his own mental stock. He gladly acknowledges afax greater debt to other writers than Ms express referencescan indicate. The bibliography, too, makes no pretenceto be exhaustive. It is confined to the books known tothe writer wMch he has found helpful, and wMch frompersonal knowledge he can commend to others. While

Til


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iil A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICSdue prominence has throughout been given to Christianexperience as the basis of Christian certainty, a lessonwhich tiie writer has learned from his study of KatschI, hehas endeavoured to recognise the just right of reason, andso to be true to the influence of the great teacher., to whosomemory this book is dedicated

NEW COLLEGES,


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CONTENTSOHAPTEB 1

SAflHTHB TCSfOSl JUfD TH PSO2LS2 . * 1

(I) Derlration and meaning of the word ; (2) Historical surrey *(3) Definition of the purpose ; (4) The relation of Apologeticsto Dogmatics ; (I) Halation to Science and Philosophy, and toCriticism and the comparator* study of Bligioi&, and &xmlihig Problems.

OHAPTEE nSSUGIOF A3TO BXTBLATIOIT .*BBU&IOH (1) Th TJidTersdity and Hftcssaity of(2) The Unity of tkt Beligioru Consciousness ; (3) The deacrip-tion of Ecligion, its factors and phases; (4) Tht ralne of

BeJigion ; (5) The TaHditj of lUligion ; (6) Tlio coaneetiom ofEellgion and History ; (7) Beligioa and lUvelatioiuXL EST3LATION (1) The reality ef BeYelatioa ; (2) Its peimanemceand unirersality; (3) Tke claim for a special Berelfttion;(4) Tko raUffious-historicsil method ; (&) The valus-juagmsata ifBelifioii.

OHAPTEB IHBT8FXEATIOV A2HD XIBAGLB ..... 51L TH1 NATtTRAL JJIB 1KB

(1) Summary and Transition; (2) The simplest eoneeptten ofBivine Power ; (S) The origin of the idea of the Snpematurali(4) The justification of the idea; (5) The two spheres ofsnpenuktaral Divine Power, Nature and Man.

II. TEB BOCTXIKB or IJTSPIBATIO (1) InspirsMex as BeligionaEmotion; (2) The Prophetic Inspiration; (3) The Christian*Inspiration ; (4) The Apostolic Inspiration ; (I) The Inspirationof the Bible.

iz


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c A HAOT)BOOK: OF CHRISTIAN 1POLOGMTO33H. THE DOCTBB?E OP MIRACLI (1) Miracle in the Old Testament ;

(2) The relation of the Miracles of Jesus to His Person, Mission,and Message ; (3) The trustworthiness of the records ; (4) Tfccredibility of Miracle ; (5) Other Hew Testament Miraclss.

CHAPTER 1YTHE LOED JESUS OHBI8T

I. THE BEHIAL OF THE EXISTENCE OP JESUS (1) The problemstated; (2) The disproof of the negative criticism; (3) Thespeculative reconstructions untenable.

II. THE EscJHATOLOxzrcAL VIEW OF THE TEAOHQTO OF JESUS


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CHAPTER VITEH CHBIOFIAJT TOEW Ol1 D.*.... 138L THE PSBSQMAZITY OF GOD (I) Bellgfon and Theology; (2) The

Conception, defined ; (S) Objections to the Conception.H, TEB PEBROZZOZT OF GOD (1) Christian Meliorism, notPessimism or Optimism; (2) The problem of physical evil;{3} The problem of moral eTil ; (4) The practical Eolation thecondition of the theoretical,HL TH TBI-USHT OF Goi> (1} Th* reasons for tie BiTme Incarna-tion ; (2) Tke experience of iae Holy Spirit; (8) Hie religionsinterest of the Doctrine of tlie Trinity; (4) Tke terms ofdeanition,

OHAPT1ETHS CHRISTLOf TIZW OF MAX ..*.. 162

J. THE CONCEFHQK OF HuacAif PEESOHALITT (1) Some cnaracter-istics of Human Personality; (2) The question of HvmaaLiberty ; (3) The hope of Immortality.EL THB CHBIHCIAK EMPHASIS ON HUMAN SIN (1) The reality andthe Tmreriality of sin ; (2) The explanations of the origin ofsin ; (8) The delirerance from sin offered by grace.

III. THK EEOOTBBT FKOM Snr BT GKAOK (1) The growth of theChristian*. life; (2) The reality of the Ckristiaa. experience;(3) The practical test legitimate.

OHAPTEE YlHTH3S GEBISTIAJT IDEAL ......, 186

I. THE NATOEB OF CHBHTIAIT MoBAtrrr-~{l) The relation ofChristian Keligion and Morality; (2) The errors of Quietism andMysticism ; (S) No casuistry in Christian Morality ; (4) Thesources of the Christian Ideal.

IL THB MODERN CHALLXHOB OF THB CHRISTIAK IDEAL (1) Theteaching of Jesus as penitential discipline and interim ethic;(2) The pollution of Morality by religious sanctions, and ' otherworldliness'; (8) Christian Morality as servile (Nietzsche);(4) Christian Morality as anarchic (Tolstoy) ; (5) The Ideal asindividualist or socialist ; (6) The Ideal as ascetic.

IIL THB RSAUSATIOH OF THB CHRISTIAN IDEAL (1) Christianityspirit and not letter ; (2) The Christian Ideal for Christians,not the world.


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xli A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICSOHAPTEB IX

THE CHEIWUOr X0fl ........L THB CoiraiHT OF m CwraAir Hoya (1) Th* earlyChriftiaji csckatology ; (2) Yht relation of this tscfcatology totkt diziitlftn Hopt ; ($) Tit definition of tki Christian Hop ;(4) TJs Hopt as iadiridnal and imiTertal.

II. TEB B&iLBOjri ?o& tMB UHITXRIAL CHBISTIAH HOPS


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A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIANAPOLOGETICS

CHUPTEB IINTEODIICTOmT

The Pwpose


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2 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CTULondon,' and as a noun In Bacon's Advancement of Learn-ing, but spelt Apologetique* The first use of the pluralform for * the defensive method of argument ' is found inNorth's Lives about 1733, 'to drop these apologetics.'The first use in the strictly technical sense of * the argu-mentative defence of (liiisManity,* seems to be found in thePenny CydofoeMa in 1834. *Th science of apologeticswas unknown till the attacks of the adversaries ofChristianity assumed a learned and scientific character.'In the same sense the angular form of the word occursin the Athmceum, 1882: *The Mud of book . . . mostrational of all in the way of Christian apologetic.* aWhether in the plural or the singular form it seems desir-able to treat the word as a collective singular, just as wetreat mathematics, etMcs, or aesthetics ; and in the follow-ing pages the writer will use the corresponding verb orpronoun in the singular, even when the plural form of theword may be employed. It need hardly be added thatthe less reputable use of apology in the sense of an excuse,more or less invalid, or of apologetic as describing an un-dignified or even servile manner, is quite irrelevant to themeaning of the word Apologetics.

(2) Before attemptingmore closelyto define the purposeofApologetics, a brief historical survey of the more prominentwritings in this class of Christian literature may be given.

(i) Krst of all comes the New Testament. That it bearsthis character has been very ably and thoroughly shownin a recent book, Scott's The Apologetic of the New Testa-ment. * Erom the beginning,' he says, c our religion hadbeen called on to defend itself against misunderstandingsand bitter opposition. Our Lord Himself is aware thatHis legacy to His followers will not be peace, but a sword,and the strife which He anticipated began with the verymoment of His death. His disciples were thrown from thefirst into conflict with their own countrymen. The Gentilemission involved them in a further conflict with the Pagan

* SeeLiddelland Scott's Greek-Engluk L&yfami Tfcayer's Grvek-SnglbhLexicon qf the New Testament, and Moris/* JtotfKtk Ms^tmry, ToL L


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ij H?TM)I)UCTOBY 3world, to which their manage proved strong aad unin-telligible. At every step of its progress Christianity wasexposed to some fresh antagonism, and could only mam-tain itself by an unceasing straggle. Our New Testamentcame into being in the process of this straggle which Iseverywhere reflected in it. Paul and Ms fellow apostlesaxe always conscious that they stand for a religion whichis spoken against, and one chief purpose of their writing isto vindicate title gospel in view of the attacks. It may beaccepted as one of the most certain results of moderncriticism, that the New Testament is permeated with anapologetic interest, which is often strongest when it isfeast apparent.* 1 To give only a few instances, theSynoptic Gospels defend the Messiahahip of Jesus, andtie Fourth Gospel seeks to prove Him, the Incarnate Logosas Life and Light to men. The Acts of the Apostles seeksto show that Christianity is a religion deserving tolerationin the K-oman Empire. The Epistle to the Romans vindi-cates Paul's gospel. The Epistle to the Hebrews demon-strates the superiority of Christianity to Judaism as areason against apostasy.

(ii) Mention has already been made of the Apologists,and a few sentences descriptive of their labours may bequoted. * The Christians,* says Schaff, * were indeed fromthe first readyalways to grro an answer to every man thatasked them a reason of the hope that was in them. Butwhen heathenism took the field against them, not onlywith fire and sword, but with argument and slander besides,they had to add to their simple practical testimony a theo-retical self-defence. * . . The apologetic literature began toappear under the reign of Hadrian, and continued to growtill the end of our period (A.D. 311). Most of the chnrchteachers took part in this labour of their day. . . , Here atonce appears the characteristic difference between theGreek and the Latin minds. The Greek apologies are morelearned and philosophical, the Latin more practical andjuridical in their matter and style. The former labour to

* Pp. 2-3.


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4 A HANDBOOK OF APOIXJGEXICS [catpiov the tnzth of Clrastianity and its adaptedness to theIntellectual wants of man ; the latter plead for Its legalright to exist, and exhibit mainly its moral excellency andalciazy effect upon society. The Latin also are in generalmore rigidly opposed to heathenism, while the Greeksrecognise in the Grecian philosophy a certain affinity to theChristian religion.* * One of the earliest and also finestexamples of this class of literature is the Epistle to Diog-wins, th authorship of which is altogether unknown. * Itis/ says Schaff,

*a brief but masterly vindication of Christianlife and doctrine from actual experience. It is evidently

the product of a man of genius, fine taste, and classicalculture. It excels in fresh enthusiasm of faith, richness ofthought, and elegance of style, and is altogether one of themost beautiful memorials of Christian antiquity, unsur-passed aaid hardly equalled by any genuine work of theApostolic Fathers.** Among th most notable of theGreek apologies, which we possess complete, are the worksof Justin, who died in 166. His first or larger Apology,and Ms second or smaller Apology, * are both a defence ofthe dsristians and their religion against heathen calumniesand persecutions. He demands nothing but justice for hisbrethren, who were condemned without trial, simply asChristians and suspected criminals.' 'His Dialogue is avindication of Christianity from Moses and the prophetsagainst the objections of the Jews.9 * Mmucius Felix, aconvert, * who brought the rich stores of classical cultureto the service of Christianity/ and who * shares withLactantius the honour of being the Christian Cicero/ wrote* an apology of Christianity in the form of a dialogue underthe title Octavius? * It gives us a lively idea of the greatcontroversy between the old and the new religion amongthe higher and the cultivated classes of Roman society, andallows fair play and full force to the arguments on both sides.It is an able and eloquent defence of monotheism againstpolytheism, and of Christian morality against heathen

I AnU-Nicene Christianity, vol. L pp. 106-6.* Ibid., ii p. 701. . Pp. 71647.


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L] rSTRODUCTOBT iImmorality. But this is about all. The exposition of thetruths of Christianity is meagre, superficial, and defective.* *The last sentence indicates a not uncommon fault in someof these writings a greater mastery of the philosophyabandoned than of the faith accepted.

(iii) One of the classical works in Christian literature isAugustine's City of God. In the days when Rome wastottering to her fall, many minds were terning from thenew faith to the old, and aiguing that Paganism mighthave preserved what Quistianity was destroying.* Augustine/ says Fanrbaim, * stood forward to defend theFaith so gravely assailed. Hia apology was twofold, con-cerned at once fact and idea. As to the matter of fact,Rome, he pleaded, was dying of her pagan vices/ and ' theBorne that had died of Paganism Christ was doing Hisbest to save. But it was the matter of ideal principlethat moved Augustine to grandest eloquence and argument.8To the earthly city of Rome he opposed the heavenly cityof the Christian Church. * The city of Rome ruled thebodies and died through the vices of its people ; but thiscity rules the spirits and lives through the virtues of itscitizens, the saints of God.' 2

(iv) During the centuries after the fall of Rome, whenChristianity, having become dominant, was subjecting toChristian culture and civilisation the new nations whichrose upon Rome's ruins, apologetic literature was notcalled for. In the tenth and eleventh centuries a revivalof religion was accompanied by an intellectual awakening,and men were trying to understand by reason what onthe authority of the Church they had accepted by faith.A leader in this movement was Anselm, who combinedwith a profoundly religious spirit *a confidence in thepower and validity of human thought which lends anextraordinary boldness to much of his speculation.' Whilehe confesses as his guiding principle, Oredo ut intettigam,and subordinates human reason to ecclesiastical authority,

i Ante-Nicene Christianity, ii. pp. 835-8.a Fairbairn'a The City cf God, pp. 850-2.


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6 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CH.yet he holds that dogma Is rational. His Mondhgium* attempts, putting aside all Scripture authority, toprove the being of God in the light of pure reason, and thento define His nature and attributes, His relation to theworld and men.' In a second work, the Proslogium, hemdvances the ontological argument for the existence ofGod, about which there has since been so much discussion.1

(v) At the Reformation there arose the necessity fordefending the doctrines advanced by Luther and otherreformers. Melanchthon was the author of the AugsburgConfession, * the authoritative exposition of the Lutherantheology/ and also of 6 the copious Apology for the Con-fession.' 2 Calvin's Chnstiance Rdigionis Instttutio isavowedly apologetic in intention. * He says in his prefacethat he wrote the book with two distinct purposes. Hemeant it to prepare and qualify students of theology forreading the Divine Word, that they may have an easyintroduction to it, and be able to proceed in it withoutobstruction. He also meant it to be a vindication of theteaching of the Reformers against the calumnies of theirenemies, who had urged the King of France to persecutethem and drive them from [France.' * As it was a defence ofa particular kind of doctrine which was being offered, thedogmatic could be combined with the apologetic method,although generally it is desirable to distinguish and separatethem,

(vi) The greater liberty add activity of mind withinChristendom since the Renaissance and the Reformationhave involved more numerous and thorough attacks onChristian truth, and have, therefore, necessitated a moreconstant and varied defence* But for the present purpose,to illustrate what the task of Apologetic has been conceivedto be, only two works need be mentioned, Butler's Analogy(1736) and Paley's Natural Theology (1803). Butler doesaot attempt a complete defence of the Christian faith. * I

* See Welch's Ansdm and Bis Work, chap. ir.a Fisher's History of Christian Doctrine, p. 273.* Lindsay's History of the Reformation^ ii. p. 99.


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i*] BTTEOBUCTOEY 7desire it may be considered, that in this treatise I haveargned upon the principles of others, not my own ; andI have omitted what I think true and of the utmost import-ance, because by others thought unintelligible, or not true/Deism opposed to Christianity a natural religion, all addi-tions to which were declared to be injurious accretions.In his Analogy Butler goes out to meet the foes in theirown field, whereas in his Sermons (1726) he states his ownposition, a theism based on the testimony of conscience.'It was characteristic/ says Fairbaim, 'that Butler'sAnalogy was more esteemed than his Sermons on HnmanNature ; an argument that proved natural religion, whichyet never was a religion of nature, to be more heavilyburdened by intellectual and moral difficulties, whentaken by itself, than when completed and crowned byrevealed, was much better adapted to the age than onebuilt on the supremacy of conscience. The latter was solittle considered that its fundamental inconsistency withthe doctrine of probability on which the Analogy is basedwas never perceived.* 1 All Butler aimed at was to showthat even on the principles accepted by his opponents,Christianity could claim greater probability as a solutionof moral and religious problems than could natural religion.The limitation of his aim must be regarded in the valua-tion of Ms work, which displays what we shaE soon seeto be a necessary feature of apologetic literature, a closeadaptation to the intellectual situation. Paley has inrecent years been much disparaged, but he must bejudged, not from the standpoint of the knowledge ofto-day, but of his own time. He satisfied its intellectualnecessities, as he expressed its mental tendencies. 'ForTheism/ says Fairbairn, * the argument from design wasin the ascendant ; adaptation was as charmed a wordthen as evolution is now ; everything was judged by itsfitness for its end the more perfect the contrivance themore irrefragable the evidence. Design was discoveredin the organs of sense, in the hand of man, in the relation

* Fairbaim's Christ in Modem Thedogy, p. IL


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S A HANDBOOK OF CHRISHA3? IPOLOGETICSbetween the functions of digestion and the chemistry offood, in all the adaptations of man to nature and natureto man/ * It is on this argument Paley mostly relies,and he manipulates Ms material with consummate sMll/drawing on * all the sciences of Ms day/ and seeminglywilling to use whatever contemporary thought offered

(TO) During the last century there was an enormousexpansion of human knowledge, a profound modificationof human thought ; and that is the sole reason whyButler and Paley seem to us to be so inadequate to theapologetic task. No work dealing with the contemporarysituation has as yet acquired the same reputation as thesebooks had in their own day. A vindication of religiousexperience, even in somewhat abnormal forms, has beenoffered in James's Varieties of Religious Experience. Anargument for the value of religion as a potent factor

inSocial Evolution has been developed by Benjamin Kidd.Balfour in Ms Foundations of Belief, however unsatisfactoryMs construction, has in his criticism most effectivelyexposed the pretensions of naturalism. One can hardlyestimate too Mghly the value of Ward's two series ofGifford Lectures, Naturalism and Agnosticism and theRealm of Ends, as a defence of theism against opposingscientific and philosopMcal tendencies of to-day. Thewriter is constrained as a tribute of affection and gratitudeto mention the work of his two honoured teachers, EdwardCaird and Andrew M, Fairbalrn. The former has from theHegelian standpoint described The Evolution of Religion,and the latter has very fully and thoroughly expounded ThePhilosophy of the Christian Religion. Bruce endeavouredto cover the whole field, philosopMcal, historical, critical, inhis book on Apologetics ; and, in essaying so wide a task,exposed his limitations as well as displayed his excellences.*

* Faifbairn's UfvriM in Modern Theology, p. 11.2 Caldecotfs The Philosophy of Religion, p. 180.* For other modern works the bibliography at the end of thto volume maybe consulted.


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1,1 INTEODUCTOEY 9(3) In the sub-title of Ms book, Brace has described

Apologetics as Christianity defensively sMed.(i) He quotes Ebrard's Apologetik, L 3, to show the

distinction between an Apology and Apologetics, and thequotation is significant enough for our purpose to berepeated in full * Apologetic differs from simple apologyby method based on a distinct principle. There areapologies which consist of replies to definite attacks onChristianity, and allow their method to be determined bythese. Such, e.g. f were the two apologies of Justin Martyr,which deal with a series of single attacks, and are excellentas apologies, though very Insufficient as apologetic.Christian apologetic differs from apology in this that,instead of allowing its course to be fixed by the accidentalassaults made at a particular time, it deduces the methodof defence and the defence itself out of the essence ofChristianity. Every apologetic is apology, but not everyapology is apologetic. Apologetic is that science which,from the essence of Christianity itself, determines whatMnds of attack are possible, what sides of Christian truthare open to attack, aad what false principles lie at thefoundation of all attacks actual or possible.7

(ii) Bruce himself declines to tread this high * a priori *way, he prefers the more lowly *a posteriori* path;instead of trying to deduce from the essence of Christi-anity what attacks arepossible and what defences necessary,he prefers by the method of historical induction to learnc both the sources of attack and the laws of defence.' * Hisown intention he clearly expresses in his preface to hisbook : c It is an apologetic presentation of the Christianfaith with reference to whatever in our intellectual environ-ment makes faith difficult at the present time. The con-stituency to which it addresses itself consists neither ofdogmatic believers, for whose satisfaction it seeks to showhow triumphantly their faith can at all possible points ofassault be defended, nor of dogmatic unbelievers whomit strives to convince or confound, but of men whose

1 Brace's Apologetics, p. 84.


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10 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CM.sympatMes are with Christianity, but whose faith is** stifled or weakened by anti-Christian prejudices of variednature and origin.** The aim dictates the method. Itleads to the selection of topics of pressing concern, burn-ing questions, leaving on one side, or throwing into thebackground, subjects which formerly occupied the fore-ground in apologetic treatises.' 1

(iii) With very slight modifications the writer acceptsthis statement of the purpose of Apologetics. Dr. Brace'sown words suggest a change of his sub-title. He is notcontent with, nor even does he maMy aim at, defence.He wants to win the doubtful rather than the denying,the hesitant rather than the defiant; he desires not toconfute and confound, but to persuade. Hence his moreappropriate sub-title would be Christianity persuasivelystated* This the writer wishes to emphasise, as what hedesires is to win for the Christian faith the unbeliever orthe doubter, and to strengthen the faith of the believerwho is bewildered and uncertain. It is no merely verbalalteration which is involved, but it is a general attitudewhich is insisted on ; and needs to be insisted on, as theconverse has been too prevalent. There are books ofApologetics the mention of which would give them anadvertisement which they do not deserve, of which itcould be said that in them Christianity is offeTisivdystated both in the primary and secondary sense of theword. To attack is as legitimate as to defend. The mosteffective attack may sometimes be the most efficientdefence. To prove Christianity true it may be necessaryto prove its rivals or opponents false. Even persuasionmay require -an exposure of the inadequacy and defectof views that hinder acceptance of the Christian faith,as well as a display of the excellence and sufficiency ofChristian truth. The war may be earned into the enemy'scamp, as well as be waged around the citadel of the faith.But the rules of civilised warfare must be strictly observed.The secondary sense of the word offensive as regards the

* Brace's Apologetics, pp. v-vL


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xI INTBODUCIOEY IImanner must not go along with the primary sense asregards the method. The attack has been made on theposition of opponents with a fierceness of tone and a ruth-lessness of logic that discredit rather than defend theChristian position. To write as though one's own argu-ment were so irrefutable that only a fool could fail toaccept it, and only a knave could dare to reject it, is toprovoke and not to persuade opponents. The mannershould be appropriate to the matter and the method.A gospel of grace should be commended and defendedgraciously.

(iv) While Apologetics must address itself to the * burn-ing questions/ its method need not be unsystematic, asBrace's words suggest, although Ms own book is not. Thewriter in this volume, however, has attempted to order hismaterial in such a way as, while dealing with the * topicsof pressing concern/ to present as continuous an argumentas he can. There is a common intellectual, moral, andreligious situation, to which we may apply the term organic.The difficulties, the doubts, and the denials in regard tothe Christian faith are not isolated or unrelated, but areconnected in many ways ; and accordingly the Christianargument that meets all these may aim at unity, even ifit should fail in achieving it entirely. A glance at thetable of contents in this book might suggest that the writeris offering rather an exposition of the Christian faith thana defence. How these two treatments of the commonsubject are related to one another is the question thatmust next be discussed.

(4) It is usual among systematic theologians to offerthe exposition of Christian truth in three divisions : Apolo-getics, dogmatics, ethics. The distinction of the secondand the third is obvious. The former deals with whatthe Christian believes, and the latter with what the Christianought to be and to do. The former describes the objectof faith, the latter determines the ideal of duty. But itis not quite so easy to determine the limits of Apologeticsand dogmatics, or to separate their contents from one


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12 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN AFOLOGEEK^another. It lias even teen aigued that theie Is no need fora special branch of theology Apologetics to undertakethe task of defending or commending Christianity, for thestatement of the Christian faith in dogmatics should beitself the best defence or commendation which can beoffered of it. But against this view two considerationsmay be advanced. A complete constructive * statementmay be made without discussing in detail the objectionsfrom different standpoints advanced against Christianity ;and yet it is necessary and desirable that these objectionsshould be thoroughly met. Further, the standpoint ofdogmatics is that of Christian faith. As that faith is notcommon to all, there is room for, and need of, a branchof Christian theology which will seek the points of contactbetween Christian faith and the current thought and life,in order to show how an advance may be made from thelatter to the former. Christian Apologetics seeks to winfor the Christian faith, which dogmatics describes, and theChristian duty, which ethics prescribes, thoughtful andserious men by, on the one hand, removing the hindrancesthat contemporary modes of thought or life may interpose,and on the other, presenting the arguments that appealmost to the reason, and the conscience of the age. Whilein both dogmatics and ethics there must be an adaptationto the intellectual, moral, and spiritual environment, inapologetics this reference to the contemporary tendenciesand necessities must be more constant, direct, and insistent.

(5) Accordingly in Christian Apologetics we must con-cern ourselves primarily with the thought and life of ourown age, must take up the questions that are forced onChristian faith by the surroundings, and must exerciseour practical wisdom in determining what are the subjectswhich, in the defence or the commendation of the Christiangospel, the contemporary conditions make most urgent.There must be selection, as it is clearly impossible that allthe matters relating to Christian creed or conduct shouldbe fully discussed. Nevertheless it is desirable that theChristian Apologist should possess for himself at least


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f-1 ECTEODUCTOEY 13some general view of the relations of the different branchesof human knowledge to one another, and of the place ofChristian theology in the system of human thought. Asthe two diiaorss of Christian theology, dogmatics andethics, show, Christianity is both religion and morality;or more correctly, even the distinction of religion andmorality is transcended in a higher unity of Christian lifereceptive from God in faith, and communicative to man inlove, while antfcipative of its perfect fruition and realisa-tion in hope. In the last two chapters of this volume therewill be offered an exposition and vindication of the Christianhope and also of the Christian ideal, as both are widelychallenged to-day, but most of this volume must be devotedto the proof that the Christian view of God, the world, andman is true ; but, as we cannot isolate Christianity fromall other religion, this involves an argument that religionis no imposture or illusion. We must maintain the signifi-cance and value of the religious view generally, and thesuperiority of the Christian view as proved truth andassured good for men. With regard to the first task we areprimarily concerned with science and philosophy, and inrespect of the second with criticism and the comparativestudy of religion,

(i) When science keeps within its own proper sphere,the observation, classification, and correlation of pheno-mena, physical, mental, or moral, or even religious, it doesnot, and cannot, come into conflict with Christian faith ;it is only when philosophical hypotheses are advanced asscientific conclusions that conflict arises. Such assertionsas that man has no liberty, but is determined by hisheredity and environment; that he is not immortal,because the brain produces thought ; that miracles areimpossible because the continuity of phenomenal causesis unbroken; that God is an unnecessary assumption,because physical force explains the universe, are notscientific, and have not the validity of conclusions reachedby the method of science ; they imply a philosophy orgeneral view of the world as a whole, and have to be met


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14 A HANDBOOK OF OHKISTIAN APOLOGETICS [on.by chalenging the adequacy of that philosophy. It istrue that Christian theology at one time felt itself boundto defend certain views about the world and man, becauseof their supposed Scriptiire authority, with which theassured results of science were in conflict. But theChristian Apologist to-day fully and frankly recognisesthat the Bible is not, and was never meant to be, a text-boqk of science. He does not challenge astronomybecause it does not assign to the earth the central positionin the universe, round which sun and stars are moving.He does not try to reconcile geology and Genesis as to theduration of the earth, or the order of the creation of plantsand beasts. He does not insist against biology on thespecial creation of every species, or regard it necessary forman's dignity to deny his physical descent from lowerforms of life. He does not maintain that primitive man wasperfect in wisdom and holiness, and is prepared to learnall that anthropology may be able to teach about man'soriginal condition. He does not argue for either the bipar-tite or the tripartite character, the dichotomy or the tricho-tomy of man's nature against the psychologist's insistenceon the unity of human personality as thinking, feeling,willing. He does feel warranted in denying as scientificcertain popular views whiah are sometimes advanced bynaturalism as based on science. Man's worth is not lessenedbecause his home appears but as a speck in the vastness ofthe universe, or his history as a span in the duration of theworld. Life has not been derived from the non-living, norconsciousness from the unconscious. Evolution has notbeen proved so continuous as to exclude fresh stages,unaccounted for by all that went before. The develop-ment of man in manners, morals, laws, society, science,philosophy, art, literature, religion proves that he is morethan one of the animals. That the primitive man is repre-sented by the savage of to-day is altogether doubtful, asdecadence is possible as well as progress.

(ii) It is not with science and its approved methods andassured results that the religious view comes into conflict,


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I.] INTRODUCTORY 15but with assumptions and conjectures that attach them-selves illegitimately to science, but axe properly describedas philosophical. ISTo philosophy can claim such a cer-tainty as could properly silence the testimony of thereligious consciousness, or of Christian faith regarding theultimate reality. With respect to the relation of ChristianApologetics to philosophy, four considerations may beoffered. In the first place, the legitimacy of the endeavoursof philosophy to form a world-view carmot be questioned.The challenge which philosophy may offer to the religiousor Christian world-view cannot be met by denying itsright to offer such a world-view, but only by showingits inadequacy or partiality.

Secondly, Christian Apologetics may insist that inanswering these last questions that the mind can ask, notonly must the speculative curiosity be satisfied, but themoral ideals must find their vindication, and the religiousaspirations their fulfilment. It is the whole man whomust answer the questions of the world-as-a-whole. Themoral conscience and the religious consciousness offerdata which must be taken into account as fully andthoroughly as the data of science. If a historical person-ality have a unique value for the moral conscience and thereligious consciousness, a corresponding estimate of himmust be allowed in any philosophy of history. The defectof most philosophies has been that they have been toodominantly intellectuaHst in interest, and too exclusivelyepistemological in method ; and this partiality is theirdefect as philosophy, and may be condemned as such.

Thirdly, the Christian Apologist may insist even thatin answering' these final questions, morality and religionare more authoritative than science. The theoreticalreason does not penetrate as deeply into the noumenal,which is the explanation of the phenomenal, as does thepractical and the spiritual reason. Rejecting Kant'sscepticism regarding the constitutive as well as regulativevalue of the ideas of the theoretical reason, we must givea wider significance to the postulates of the practical


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I 1 HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [OB.reason; and we must add, what lie was not religionsenough to add, but what the universal presence anddominant influence of religion in human experience compelsus to add, the intuitions of the spiritual reason, the humanvision of, communion with, and possession by the divine.The saint and the seer need not use the tones of * whisperinghumbleness * in the presence of the philosopher, for theyhave the secret of the holy and the divine which thoughtalone will not yield.

Fourthly, philosophy may be of great use to the ChristianApologists. There are many conclusions regarding thenature of human knowledge, the validity of humanthought, the interpretation of the world and man,which Christian Apologetics need not deal with in detail,but which it may accept from the special investigator,and utilise for its own more general purpose. Theologycannot1>e divorced from philosophy, nor need the marriagebetween them be unhappy.

(iii) It is evident that there are philosophies which socontradict the testimony of Christian faith that theChristian Apologist can only oppose and reject them. Thematerialism which attempts to account for the universeexclusively by matter-in-motion, is the denial of moralityas well as religion. The monism of a Haeckel is only amaterialism which seeks to cover its nakedness by thefig-leaf of a meaningless phrase about a reality bothmatter and mind, while it actually derives mind frommatter, and is as non-moral and irreligious. The agnosti-cism of a Herbert Spencer shows how little it apprehendsor appreciates what religion really is, when it imaginesthat it has handsomely provided for all the soufs needsby bidding it rear an altar to an Unknowable UltimateReality. Even the naturalism which, without confess-ing itself materialistic, monistic, or agnostic, as regardsthe ultimate reality, treats man as a part and product ofNature, and not as a person beyond and above Nature,and seeks to solve all problems in terms of physicalscience, degrades man in ignoring God. Not only do


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L] INTRODUCTORY 17these philosophies prove their inadequacy when moral andreligious tests are applied, but it can be shown thateven as explanations of Nature they fall short. Thenecessary limits of this volume forbid the demonstrationof their falsity here, although the writer has himself forhis own mental satisfaction gone over all the ground thatwould need to be covered ; but the reader may be referredto Ward's Naturalism and Agnosticism especially as amasterly treatment of all the questions here arising.1

(iv)The Christian Apologist assumes that man is capableof gaining and holding the truili about God, himself, andthe world, and so. giving an answer to the questions

of the essential reality, ultimate cause, and final purposeof the universe. We need not here involve ourselves inthe very abstract problem whether truth, is the agreementof thought and reality, or the consistency of thought withitself, or 'eventual verification.* What we mean bytruth is that man thinks God, world, and self as they are.It is the task of epistemdogy to deal with this problem ofthe validity of human knowledge ; and Christian Apolo-getics must reject any epistemology which denies thatman can know truth. The agnosticism of Spencer triesto limit the incapacity of the human mind to the realmof religion, while assuming that in th realm of scienceman can and does know. But any such limitation isarbitrary ; even if it were contended that sense at leastis trustworthy, for * knowledge is of things we see,* the* synthetic philosophy' could not escape doubt, for itcarries us far beyond the data of sense. The sc&pbidsmof Hume is more consistent, as it includes even the prin-ciple of causality, that basal category of modern scienceamong the things that are to be shaken ; but it is notwholly consistent, for the logical issue of scepticism isthat it annuls itself, for it must doubt its own doubt. Ifman cannot know, how can he know that he cannot know ?But Hume's scepticism has its great value in the historyof philosophy, for it is the reductio ad absurdum of the

i See also RastidalTs Philosophy and Rdigttm.B


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18 1 HANDBOOK OF GHKISTIAS APOLOGETICS [CH.empiricism, sensationalism, and associationalism thatwould derive all knowledge from an experience limitedto the data of sense, and the associations that the dataform, and imdetennined by reason in man- The intui-tionalism of the deists, and the common-sense philosophyof the Scotch school, are both right in insisting that inknowledge there is an element underived from sense;but their common assumption that the human mindbrings with it a ready-made stock of ideas, moral andreligions as well as theoretical, Is to-day an anachronismin view of what we know both of racial evolution andindividual development. Kant offered a more adequatereply to Hume than the Scotch school. He attemptedto exhibit the unity of the reason that constitutes the dataof sense into knowledge, by a more exhaustive and syste-matic analysis of the contents of knowledge, to show theprinciples necessary to knowledge as a consistent unity,But in denying the constitutive as well as regulative valueof the ideas of the pure reason, he fell back into scepticism,from which his postulates of the practical reason offeronly a sorry means of escape. We must go beyond Kantin insisting that the subjective reason is not alone in theuniverse, but reproduces the objective reason, and thatthe necessities of the one correspond to the realities ofthe other. Kant's subjective or critical idealism, if it isnot to leave us in scepticism, must lead us on to objectiveor absolute idealism. This step was taken by Hegel;but to the Hegelian solution the writer, though under thespell of the fine intellect and noble personality of EdwardCaird he was for a time held in thrall by it, must urgetwo objections. In the first place, the Absolute Spirit is tooexclusively a logical idea, or the standpoint is too narrowlyintellectualist, so that due weight is not given to thewitness of the practical and spiritual as of the theoreticalreason. In the second place, the Objective Beason is tooclosely identified with the Subjective Beason, so that theprogress of the universe through man to self-conscious-ness appears as the evolution of God Himself. Thisphilosophy is not only a pantheism, which, by abolishing


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fj INTRODUCTORY 19the distinction between God and man, and so excludingtheir mutual relations destroys religions, but as Spirit=Idea the pantheism is rather a panhgism^ as Pfleidererhas rightly described it. In Lotze's insistence on feeingas the test of value, in the tendency of modern psychologyto subordinate cognition to conation, in Eucken'sCKtiimsm, with its demand that man shall raise himselfby spiritual life into contact with the absolute spirituallife, in Bergson's plea that only by intuition can man holdreality

as a whole, while intellect seizes only one side ofit, the writer recognises movements towards what he con-ceives to be a higher standpoint. He cannot with prag-matism subordinate truth to use or worth ; for man'ssubjective purpose must in some measure correspond withthe objective purpose of Ms world, if it is not to bethwarted ; and even if his conceptions of the world areaffected by the use he desires to make of it, he will notgain the mastery over it for his own ends even, unlessthese conceptions, tested and corrected in actual contactwith the world, correspond with its reality. There is anobjective reality which reveals itself to man as ideals ofduty, and ideas of truth ; for even if man's world be inthe making, the pattern thereof is laid up in heaven.Bergson's rejection of teleology in his Creative Evolutionis surely only a prejudice against a mechanical idea ofdesign. The unity, identity, and consistency of per-sonality does not exclude liberty ; and so the immanentpurpose of the universe may realise itself in varied spon-taneous movement, and need not involve any rigid pre-determination. Personality, with final authority for themoral conscience and the religious consciousness, is forthe writer the ultimate category, perfect in the objectivereason God, progressive in the subjective reason man*He conceives man as by nature receptive mentally, morally,and spiritually for God, and God as communicative intruth, holiness, grace to man. While he does affirm acontact and communion with God of the individual manin religion, yet as humanity is organic, the individual byhis very constitution social, the individual development


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20 A HANDBOOK OF CERIS13AN APOLOGETICS [OH.is for the most part mediated by the family, tribal, national,and racial evolution. TMs philosophy may be calledpersonalism ; and it is implicit throughout all that followsin this volume, while, in discussing some of the questionsbefore us, it will necessarily be made more explicit. TMsis only a preliminary statement of it ; its exposition andjustification will be attempted in the following pages.

(v) As Christianity presents itself as a historical realty,recorded and interpreted in literary sources, the ChristianApologist cannot be indifferent to the results of literaryand historical criticism. There are many questions ofdate Mid authorship which make no difference whateverto the truth or worth of Christian faith; but with thecredibility of the literary sources as giving us the certaintyof titie historical reality of divine revelation and humanredemption in Christ we must concern ourselves in thesubsequent discussion.

(vi) The claim, for Christianity as the absolute religion,destined, because deserving, to be universal, is to-day metby the challenge of other faiths ; and that challenge doesnot come merely from the adherents of these faiths. Itis contended even by Christian thinkers that, even ifChristianity is the best and truest religion we know, wehave no right to affirm that it is the best and truest con-ceivable. The Christian Apologist must utilise the materialprovided by the comparative study of religions to showthe superiority of Christianity to all the other faiths ; withthe guidance of the psychology of religion he must discoverthe necessities and possibilities of man's religious nature,and then prove how Christ meets the one and fulfils theother. For Mm the philosophy of rdigion must afford notonly the vindication of the value of religion, and thephilosophy of theism the evidence of the validity of the ideaof God ; but both of these, under the illumination andinspiration of his Christian faith, become the tutors wholead to the Master Christ.Such are the problems with which this volume must

attempt to deal as adequately as the limits of space willallow.


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n.1 AM) EEYELAHOX 21

nESLIGJON AND BBTELATIOH

(1) DumFa last century a great change took place in thetreatment of religion by science and philosophy. It is nolonger dismissed as an invention of priests or rulers for theirown ends, or as merely a survival of barbarism, bnt acceptedas a fact to be carefully studied. The sacred scriptures ofother religions have come to be known and studied byChristian scholars ; the excavations in Egypt and Meso-potamia and other eastern lands have shown how large aplace religion filled in the ancient world ; familiarity onthe part of missionaries and travellers with the beliefsand the customs of savage peoples is proving that there isno race so low in the scale of civilisation as to be withoutsome movement of the spirit beyond the bounds of thesensible. The opinion, once held by some writers on thesubject, that there are tribes which can be described asatheistic, is now being abandoned. For we are recognisingthat the inquiry as to whether a tribe has a religion or notis not so easy as it once seemed. On the one hand, themissionary or the traveller, having his own definite con-ception of what religion should be, may fail to detectreligion

under unfamiliar forms ; and on the other hand,the native, suspicious of strangers, is likely to conceal asfar as he can what is his most sacred possession from anyprying eye. A stranger must live a long tame among anuncivilised people, and must win their confidence andintimacy, before he can gain an accurate knowledge of theirreligion. Archaeology, anthropology, and ethnology in the


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22 A HANDBOOK OF CHBISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CH.multitude of facts collected by them regarding the pastand present of mankind, are constantly confirming theconclusion that religion is universal in the race ; that man,]>eing what h is, cannot but be religious. It is possiblefor the man, whose culture has suppressed his naturalimpulses, to be secular, agnostic, atheistic ; but in thespontaneous development of human,nature religion appearsto be inevitable.

(2) The comparative study of religions leads us a stepfarther. At first sight the endless variety of religious beliefsand customs gives the impression of a chaos in which noorder or law is discoverable, but a closer study shows thathere, too, there is cosmos, for many uniformities can betraced. Differences, climatic, racial, economic, social,affect the forms which lie religious life assumes; andmuch remains to be done in showing that the diversity inthese forms is not altogether accidental or arbitrary ; yetthe soul of man is one and the same, and strikingsimilarities in religious ideas and rites prove this. Suchsimilarities need not be explained as the borrowings ofone religion from another, nor be marvelled at as curiouscoincidences, but may be regarded as evidence that thehuman mind functions in the same way, wherever theconditions are to any degree similar. It is not at all neces-sary to assume that the religious development of everypeople has been exactly the same, showing the samephases and passing through the same stages. There havebeen, in varying degrees, in different races, stagnation,progress, decadence. One race has been influenced byanother, and its progress been retarded and advanced.Nevertheless, it seems possible to sketch the normalreligious progress of the race, assigning in the process

itsproper place to each form which the religious life hasassumed.1

(3) The comparative study of religions thus leads us onto the psychology of religion. If amid all variety of beliefs

The writer lias attempted to do tils IB Ms book, The Christian Gerfafatyamid fht Modern Perplexityt pp. 64-76.


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nj RELIGION AXD REVELATION 23and customs there is but one and the same religions lifeexpressed, it is possible to study the working of the humansoul in religion, what it thinks, how it feels, at what itaims in this particular relation. What are the conceptions,emotions, and volitions which axe distinctive of religion ?It cannot be affirmed that there is any general agreementon all the questions raised ; but it may be maintained thatthere is a growing tendency towards agreement. Thereis less inclination than there was to treat religion as a kindof mental aberration ; and it is being recognised as thenormal response of the spirit of man to Ms supersensibleenvironment.

(i) Many attempts have been made to state in a fewwords what religion is. But even great thinkers havecommitted themselves to definitions which are partial.To take only three great German thinkers in illustrationof this statement Hegel, Kant, and Schleiermacher eachlays stress on only one of the psychic factors. Hegel'sview of religion as a less adequate apprehension of ultimatereality than that reached by philosophy recognises onlyits intellectual aspect. Kant's attempt to reduce religionto morality in confining it to the recognition of our moralobligations as divine commands, regards it only as practical,only in so far as it affects man's action. Schleiermachercomas nearer the core of the matter when he definesreligion as the sense of dependence on God, as feeling isessential to religion ; but he, too, unduly isolates this oneaspect from the others. What the failure of these defini-tions teaches us is, that in religion the whole personalityof man is exercised, and that thought, feeling, and will areall factors. There is not, as mysticism has sometimesassumed, an organ of religion distinct from the activity ofthe whole personality in thinking, feeling, willing ; and itcannot even be shown that there is any peculiarity in theexercise of mind, heart, and will in religion absent fromthe ordinary activity of the human personality. Sub-jectively we cannot fix what is distinctive of religion.

(ii) We must look from the subject to the object of


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24 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [OTLreligion to discover its distinetiveness* To say thatreligion is the relation of man to God is to import anadvanced stage of the development of man's religionsthought into its earlier stages. The word God has toodefinite a content to describe generally the object ofreligion. If we use the term divine at all, we must beprepared to assign to it a very vague meaning* It is thesupersensible, the superhuman, the supernatural, to whichman relates himself in his religion. He recognises beyondthe visible the invisible, above himself power greater thanMs own, over the forces of Nature, even such as he knows,forces greater still. He confesses his dependence on theseinvisible greater powers or forces ; they can advance orhinder his good, they can restrain or inflict eviL Heendeavours to enter into such relations with them as willavert their displeasure, or secure their favour.

(Hi) It is not an explanation of the world around Mmthat he primarily seeks in religion. There has been a wide-spread tendency among theologians, philosophers, andeven anthropologists to lay too much stress on tMs intel-lectual factor of religion. The theory that seeks to accountfor religion by animism, the explanation of movement andchange in the world around by the belief in spirits, tooexclusively identifies primitive religion with primitivescience or philosophy. In discarding animism science isnot superseding religion, but is itself advancing from theprimitive to the more mature intellectual stage. It isnot an intellectual curiositythatman satisfies in Ms religiousbeliefs ; he is meeting a practical necessity. It is the pro-tection of, and the provision for, Ms own life about wMchhe is concerned ; and he spontaneously, and not deliber-ately, conceives his world so that tMs purpose seemspracticable.

(iv) In the conception wMch is distinctive of religionthere is progress ; without tracing that progress in detail,we may note one feature of it : the divine is first of allconceived vaguely as a multitude of spirits, and thenmore distinctly thought of as a smaller company of gods.


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n.] RELIGION 25It is not suggested that the believer consciously makessuch a distinction ; but the modem thinker, looking backon the development, can. Spirits and gods seem to bedistinguished in three respects. The gods are more dis-stinctly conceived as like main ; their power is thoughtof as greater ; they are more supernatural and super-human, and they are in closer and more constant alliancewith their worshippers. Around the gods there gathersa growing mythology ; but this development is not purelyreligious, imagination and intellect are here activebeyond the necessities and impulses of religion. It wouldbe quite a mistake, therefore, to assume that the religiouslife Is determined by the mythology. Only a few of theideas therein expressed are religiously operative. As theintellectual development advances, there is further atendency to conceive the divine as unity ; but to thisquestion we must at a later stage of the discussion return.

(v) As man conceives of life, so will he conceive thegood to be gained, or the evil to be shunned, by the helpof the gods or spirits. In the earliest stages of develop-ment man was primarily concerned about meeting hisbodily wants ; what he sought was natural goods. Butas his social relations developed and his moral conscienceadvanced, he would seek a moral good as well as naturalgoods. The tribal deity was the guardian of the tribalcustom, as weE as the protector of the tribal existence.There has been a great deal of profitless writing about therelation of morality and religion, because the discussionhas been too abstract. If we keep our eye on the concretereality of life, and see how in human development itsrange expands and its content increases, first the natural,next the social, then the moral, we shall understand howat first religion seems to subserve only natural goods,and how only slowly it comes to be allied with the moralgood. As we shall afterwards see, in the highest stagemorality is inseparable from religion.

(vi) However man conceive the end of his life, for its at-tainment he feels his need, and so seeks the aid of the spirits


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26 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CBLor gods. What means does he use to secure their favouror to avert their displeasure ? Prayer and sacrifice arthe means recognised in all religions. It is held by somethinkers, however, that either magic preceded, or^may beregarded as a supplement to, these means. In his magicman believed himself to be able to bring about ^suchchanges in the world around as he desired ; he believedthat he could raise the wind, bring down the rain, or makehis fields fruitful by the use of such means as seemedappropriate to Mm e.g. sprinkling the ground with waterin imitation of the desired rain. Only when he discoveredthat Ms powers were limited did he invoke Mgher powers,and so replaced magic by religion. In the same way itis held as man discovers that science gives Mm a greatercontrol over Nature than prayer or sacrifice ever could,will he discard religion in turn. With this questionJevons has dealt fully, and has shown that magic andreligion are not so related to one another ; but that magicmay be regarded as the primitive applied science.1 Wheremagical practices continue in a religion as a means ofcoercing the gods to do man's bidding, tMs must beregarded as a relapse in the religious development, evenas irreligious, because opposed to the fundamental con-ception of the divine as the Mgher power on wMchman depends. Prayer and sacrifice then remain as thedistinctively religious acts, however complicated maycome to be the ritual wMch grows up around them. Itis only at an advanced stage of development that moralityand religion are brought into so close a relation to oneanother that the holy life comes to be regarded as thesacrifice that is acceptable unto God.

(vii) What are the emotions wMch are distinctive ofreligion ? The saying has come down to us from antiquitythat fear made the gods. It has been maintained, on thecontrary, that confidence and even affection are charac-teristic of the worsMpper towards Ms god. Such con-tradiction is due to a too abstract standpoint. The

* An Introduction to the History of Religion, chap* ir.


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nj RELIGION AND REVELATION t7environment and the circumstances of the worshipperwould largely determine Ms emotions. A nature apparentlyhostile would awaken fear ; a nature manifestly beneficentwould kindle hope. Where the deities are conceived asfor the most part unfriendly, the explanation probablyis that either natural or tribal conditions made life hardand dangerous. Even where prayer or sacrifice is offeredto avert divine displeasure, there is the assumption thatthe deities can be won over. The sentiment, whetherpainful or pleasurable, may survive the conditions thatevoked it, and so we must not look for a constant corre-spondence. The remembrance of help divinely givenbefore might sustain trust and hope of deliverance in themost adverse circumstance. The religious life is far toovariable and complex for such one-sided statementsabout the emotions peculiar to it. In religion there isexperience of the divine presence. The worshipper feelshimself in the presence of, or even possessed by, Ms god.The feeling may be one of awe and terror, or of exalta-tion. However artificial may be the means used toproduce such ecstatic conditions, we cannot dismiss asaltogether unreal tie sense of the divine which theworshipper may sometimes possess.

(viii) There is a belief so closely related to the belief ingods that the two beliefs have been treated as identical ;the belief in ghosts, or the survival of the dead. HerbertSpencer would explain all religious ceremonies as funeralrites, and Grant Allen traces the god back to the ghost.In the two conceptions there is much in common. Theconception of the soul as distinct from the body makespossible the belief that the soul may survive the death ofthe body. As sleep is a temporary, so death is a permanentseverance of the soul from the body. The conception ofthe spirits, out of which the idea of the gods, as has alreadybeen indicated, slowly emerges, is similar, for they arerelated to material objects and physical changes as thesoul is to the body and its movements. But it is notproved that the belief in ghosts preceded tha belief in


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28 A HANDBOOK OF APOWGETICS [cotspirite. As soon as man gained, in whatever way, therudimentary sense of the distinction of soul and body, hewould probably apply it to explain change to Naturearound Mm directly, without the d&our of belief in ghosts.It is much more likely that he conceived Nature in thelikeness of his own living self than of Ms dead ancestors.His primitive speculation about the world around Mmwould be as early as about his future destiny. Whatfor our purpose must be emphasised, is that the belief inthe survival of death arises as spontaneously as the beliefin spirits or gods. In the course of religious developmentthe gods are brought into relation to the unseen world asexercising authority there as here, and as thus affectingman's future destiny as well as Ms present existence.As the deities become moralised, and their rule recog-nises moral distinctions among men, that life hereaftermay be conceived as the scene of moral judgment, as inthe Egyptian Book of the Dead ; and the vague concep-tion of the continued existence of ghosts haunting theirold homes may yield to the more definite idea of a separa-tion of good and bad in an abode of bliss or a place of woe.In the course of religious development Kant's threepostulates of the practical reason, God, freedom, andinunortality, are brought into ever closer relation.

(ix) This description of religion, wMch is based on thefacts of man's religious history, spares us the profitlessabstract discussions about the definition of religion andthe theories of its origin. In religion, as we have seen,man seeks through prayer and sacrifice to secure theaid of the supersensible, supernatural, and superhumanpowers wMch he conceives as controlling Nature, andso determining his own life, to realise his good, natural,moral, or future, however he may think of it. The earliestform of religion most imperfectly discloses its nature,wMch is displayed only in its progressive evolution, andit is a fallacy to offer an account of the alleged primitivereligion as a theory of its origin, Religion is one of man'sresponses to the world around Mm, and it is no more to


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n.J RELIGION AND REVELATION 29be identified with, its earliest form than is majfs scienceand morality, or to be discredited by its lowly origin thanthese are.

(4) All that the psychology erf religion can do is to showwhat are the factors, intellectual, emotional, volitional, inthe activity of the personalty as religions; what are theconditions and stages of the development of the religiousconsciousness. It can answer the questions what and how,but it cannot say why. With the value of religion thephilosophy of religion is concerned. That philosophy mustdeal with religion as one element in man's complex life, itmust showhow it has influenced morality and the evolutionof society, how it has affected culture and civilisation, andhow it has been related to knowledge in science or phil-osophy, and must estimate whether it has been a helpfulor a harmful force in human progress.

(i) The estimate of the Epicurean Lucretius that religionwas responsible for many and great evils,1 is not prevalentto-day. Positivism, hostile to Christianity, recognises theneed of religion for social morality ; and Benjamin KMd,whose method of stating his case is open to serious criticism,has laboured to prove that it is religion which gives altru-ism the victory over egoism, and that this is the conditionof social progress.2 Something has already been said asto the influence of religion on morality, and any unpreju-diced consideration of the course of European history willestablish the conviction that, despite all the errors oforganised Christendom in clinging to old moral conven-tions when the moral spirit had advanced beyond them,the Christian ideal and motive has been a potent instrumentin moral progress. One need not exaggerate the super-stition and corruption of the pagan ancient world, or ignorethe purifying and ennobling influence of ancient philosophy,to be convinced that the moral difference between ancientand modern society is mainly due to the leaven of Christian-ity. The transformation that is taking place all over the

* 'Tantum religio potnit snadere malonun.' De Merum Ncs&wu, i. L 102* Social Evolution and Principles of Western Civilisation.


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W A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CSLworld In savage races under the activity of Christianmissions, although, elements of evil mingle with the good,the chaff with the wheat* is in the present confirming thetestimony of the past. As a religion becomes more moralIt reinforces morality, and so strengthens society, and thetendency in a developing religion is towards a closer alliancewith morality. Christianity demands a holy life in thechildren of the Holy Father, and with its emphasis on lovethrows th stress on social morality.2 This Christian idealNietzsche as vainly as arrogantly challenges. Here isnot needed any detailed proof of the inspiration religionhas given to art and literature. The value of religion hereis not seriously challenged ; but we are confronted with amore serious problem when we face the relation of religionto science or philosophy.

(ii) If, on the one hand, Comte, in the interests of science,and a philosophy developed into a religion based onscience, relegated theology to the lowest superseded stageof human evolution, and Spencer to gain freedom to con-struct a synthetic philosophy in terms of matter-in-motion,with feigned courtesy bowed religion out of the narrowrealm of the Known into the boundless region of the Un-knowable, some Christian theologians on the other havebeen foolish enough to oppose Genesis to astronomy,geology, biology, or anthropology as * science falsely so-called.* The contrast between religion, on the one hand,and science or philosophy on the other hand, is twofold ;the habits of mind resulting are different, and the conclu-sions advanced may conflict. The methods of science,observation, classification, experiment, generalisation, arenot those of religion, which are the intuition of the seer, theecstasy of the worshipper, the submission of the saint.Science aims at being as objective as possible, religion isreal only as the objects of faith subjectively affect thebeliever. Philosophy, too, aims at the oBjectivity of arational system, the parts of which are logically connectedapartfrom the wishes and beliefs of the thinker. Here there

a See the Tolume entitled Christ and Civilisation.


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nj RELIGION AND IIis less success, however, in rigidly excluding t the personaequation/ and even in systems such as Spinoza's or Hegel'sthe personality of the thinker betrays itself. Religion,although in its theology it may move outward to thecircumference of a rational system, in its most intense formmoves inward to the centre of the human personalty incontact and communion with, dependent on, and domin-ated by the divine. The man of science or the philosopherseeks to master reality by knowledge and reason, the manof religion is mastered by a reality, supersensible, super-natural, which transcends the reality which science explainsor philosophy interprets. Science ignores the noumenal,philosophy uses it to rationalise the phenomenal ; but in itreligion lives, and moves, and has its being. Eminent menof science have been pious Christians ; but in most if notall these cases the intellect, so active in the Investigationof nature, has not been equally exercised in the interpreta-tion of religion, and the fearless inquirer in the one realmhas often acquiesced in the current orthodoxy in the other.Evenwhen the seer or saint does not distrust science, he doesnot feel at home in it. How often does the philosopherwith Ms logical abstractions, the net in which he thinks hehas caught the universe, although much that has mostvalue for religion and morality has slipped through itsmeshes, stand aloof from, and in some cases even assumean attitude of too conscious superiority to, the moralpurposes and the religious aspirations of men living in-tensely and strenuously. This intellectual detachmentfrom the emotional stress and the volitional strain of lifeis not an advantage, but a defect, when not this or thataspect of reality is to be apprehended in thought, but whenthe total reality is to be appreciated in its worth, andappropriated in its aim. Morality in the good it seeks,and religion in the good it has found, are approaches toultimate reality not less, but more vital than those ofscience and philosophy, and probably give a more immedi-ate contact with that ultimate reality than knowledge canever give. To assert this is not to be guilty of irrational-


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32 A HANDBOOK 01 (MBISTIAN APOI0GEXXCS [OH.ism, but simply to demand that all the data of life as wellas thought must be taken into account in any answer toit lost questions of the mind.

(5) If, however, we are to assart the value of religion aswell as morality, even for human knowledge, we must beable to maintain the validity of the intuitions of religionregarding the ultimate reality. For science and phil-osophy may reach conclusions regarding what the universein its primal cause and final purpose is, which are in con-flict with the certainty of religion that the divine, howeverapprehended, is that in which all things are, from whichthey move, towards which they tend. To reconcile thisconflict must be the function of the philosophy of theismwhich it seems to the writer desirable to distinguish fromthe phUoso^y of religion, reserving to the latter the proofof the subjective value of religion as a factor in humanexperience and development, and assigning to the formerthe evidence for the objective validity of the conceptionof the divine for the interpretation of the universe as awhole. It is quite evident that as it is not the task of thephilosophy of religion to assert the value of any religiousbelief, rite, and custom, but to separate the accidentalfrom the essential in religion, and to vindicate only thelatter, so it is not the function of the philosophy of theismto claim for every conception of the divine that it is true,but to follow the process of self-ciiticism in the develop-ment of theism, and to subject to a strict criticism even theoutcome of that process in the idea of God in the Christianreligion. But to this duty we must return in a subsequentchapter (Chapter vi.).

(6) We have so far endeavoured to treat religion as aunity ; but it need hardly be said that this is a unity invariety. The religion of savages can be described by thegeneral tarn animism, and shows great similarities inbelief, rite, and custom, but in the course of human develop-ment in the peoples who have advanced in culture andcivilisation, religion has changed its forms ; polydaemon-ism is superseded by polytheism, a mythology is enshrined


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XL] RELIGION AM) REVELATION 33in the literature as in Egypt, Assyria and Babylon, andIndia. In a few cases a more thorough transformationhas taken place under the dominating influence of a greatpersonality, as in the Buddhism of India, the Zoroastrian-ism of Persia, the Mohammedanism of Arabia, the Con-fucianism of China. Some religions are literary, inpossessing sacred scriptures ; a few are historical as wellin the sense of showing a record of development, the actionof a person or persons. Although the object of religionthe divine is eternal, the subject of religion man isaffected by temporal conditions, and so history and religionare brought into close alliance. It is quite impossible toregard the historical form of the religions which have suchrecords of progress as accidental, for the conception of thedivine itself is vitally related to the person and work of thefounder of the religion, and the piety of the professors ofthe religion attaches itself immediately to the founder.When in a subsequent chapter we come to deal with thehistorical reality of Jesus Christ, it will be necessary toconsider more closely this connection of religion withhistory.

(7) There is an assumption in all religion, the significanceof which has not been adequately appreciated by ChristianApologists. In their zeal to prove the value of the Christianrevelation, they have failed to acknowledge fully that allreligion as sincere implies revelation as real. In the beliefs,rites, customs of all religions there is much that is merelytraditional and conventional ; and probably the majorityof the professors of a religion seldom, if ever, get beyondsuch a remote relation to the object of worship. Butreligion at its core is more than this, and the more devoutworshippers seek more than this. Some contact and com-munion with, some communication from or possession bythe deity worshipped is sought. In totemism by partakingof the sacred flesh of the animal that as a class is the deityof the tribe, the tribesmen seek to renew the common lifeof god and worshipper* In the exercises to bring abouttrance or ecstasy there is the endeavour to come intoO


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34 A HANDBOOK Of CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CDHimmediate relation to the divine. This mystic element,if, failing a better word} we must so describe it, is vitalto religion. If religion be a mutual relation of divineand human, of deity and worshipper, the divine mustparticipate in it as well as the human, the deity mustrespond in gifts to the prayers or sacrifices of the wor-shipper. Religion would be utter illusion if man in hisreligion is simply projecting himself into, satisfying him-self with, the void of his own imagination and desire.Religion necessarily implies revelation.

(I) In the religious consciousness man is aware of theworld, himself, and God. Of himself he has a directknowledge in his self-consciousness ; he is a self only in themeasure that he thus knows himself. Of the world he hasa mediated knowledge through his senses, and what hismind makes of the data of sense. What is his knowledgeof God ? If world and self are for him real, so he believesGod to be real. But if he knows himself in his ownactivities, if he knows the world through the effects in hissensations of its changes and movements, does he not alsoknow God as real, because active mediately in the worldaround him, and more directly in his own religious impulsesand aspirations ? It takes the sophisticated logician toconceive, and the sophisticated rhetorician to demonstrate,that while self and world are real and active, God neitheris nor acts. Man does not know God apart from self orworld, yet he distinguishes God from both. There is animpulse, native to religion, to raise the divine above thenatural and the human. The degeneration of religion hasalways been when God was conceived too exclusively fromthe standpoint of world or self. The advance of religionhas been secured by a purification and elevation of theconception of the divine above the merely natural or human.How could man so rise above himself and his world to thinkof God as greater, mightier, wiser, better than all he found


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n-1 RELIGION AND REVELATION 35within or without, unless God Himself was a presentreality to Ms consciousness, self-communicative to Ms mindor spirit ? Man can know God only as God makes Himselfknown. For to treat man's knowledge of God as an ideal-isation of himself only does not explain how man is ableso to stretch above his own stature ; and to treat hisdependence on, or submission to, God as a confidence inhimself, or an obedience to himself, is to make what meetshis needs, comforts his sorrows, and rescues him from Msdistresses a self-mockery. To interpret God in terms ofself or world only is to treat religion not as true butas fictitious, and so to deny its truth, worth, or claim.Religion is an illusion unless revelation be a reality.1

(2) We must insist that this revelation is fermanemt andvmversal.(i) We dare not say in view of the permanence and the

universality of religion in the history of mankind, that inany age or in any land God has left Himself altogetherwithout witness. There is in man, always and every-where, the impulse to seek and to find God in the worldaround or in his own soul ; and it is God Himself whoinspires the aspiration, to which He then gives the satis-faction. Man's receptivity for, and responsiveness to, thisactivity of God varies with the manifold and changefulconditions of his thought and life. The conception of thedivine is conditioned by his apprehension of the meaningof the world, and his appreciation of the worth of himself.We may, if we are foolish enough, ask the vain question :Why was mankind not made perfect in knowledge,morality, and religion f But accepting the fact of evolu-tion, the gradual progress of mankind, it is no more areproach to religion that the truth about God has beenreached only through many mistakes and errors, than itis to science or morality that their progress has been soslow along what seem now so devious paths. In religionas well as morality we see, even more than in knowledge,

1 See the writer's article on * Berelation * in Hastings* Bffile Dictionary,Extra Volume, pp. 321-36.


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36 A HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS [CH.aberrations and perversions, the more offensive to usbecause of the value of that which is thus misrepresented

(ii) In the sacred scriptures of the different literaryreligions the claim is advanced that God has spoken toman, and that in these writings God's message is enshrined.The founders of the great religions claimed to have receiveda word of truth for their fellows. Even Gautama, in whosereligion the gods of the native religion play no part, claimsthe discovery of a secret of salvation, for the communicationof which he is entitled the Buddha, or Enlightener. Howimpossible it is in the highest concerns of the soul for themind to confine itself within the rigid circle of the humanis shown by the later developments of Buddhism, wherethe man Buddha becomes a supernatural being. Prosaicand unspiritual as in many respects Confucius was, yet hebelieved himself to be doing the will and interpreting themind of Heaven in his teaching. Man cannot rest in anytruth as ultimate in the concerns of the soul unless hebelieves that it comes from the ultimate reality*

(iii) The Holy Scriptures of the Christian faith concedethe reality of a wider revelation of God to man. To con-fine our illustrations to the New Testament only, Jesusgees the care and bounty of the Heavenly Father in thebirds of the air and the flowers of the field, and He gladlyand thankfully welcomes all tokens of Gentile faith. Thewriter of the Fourth Gospel in his Prologue takes up theOld Testament doctrine of the Divine Word, Wisdom, orSpirit in the Greek conception of the Logos, the self-revela-tion of God in Nature and man, and declares that thatWord has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. When con-fronted with a simple paganism, Paul at Lystra (Acts xiv.15-17) appeals to God as the Maker, and to the evidence ofHis rule in the rains and fruitful seasons filling men's heartswith food and gladness. To the more intellectual audienceat Athens (xvii. 22-31) he develops an argument againstidolatry from God's immanence and man's affinity to God.In his survey of the Gentile world in Romans i.-iL, hetraces back its moral depravity and religious degradation


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ii. j EEUGIOX AND REVELATION 37to a wilful Ignorance of God, and a consequent wilfulperversion of the worship and service of God, In Gala-tians (iv. 1-9) he seems to see in the pagan world as inJudaism a preparation for the Gospel. The comparativestudy of religions confirms this conviction of religion, thatnot only is there the movement of mankind towards God,but that in that very movement God has been approachingman.

(3) Christian Apologists have sometimes tried to showthat Christianity is true by seeking to prove that all otherreligions are false. Such a defence is not only logicallyweak, as it is more difficult to secure credence for onereligion if all other religions are declared untrustworthy ;but it is inconsistent with the gracious spirit of the Christianfaith. A religion for which God is love must deal verylovingly with al endeavours of the spirit of man to findGod. The recognition of the permanence and universalityof the divine revelation, as the necessary condition of anyvalue and validity in human religion, does not shut out,however, the claim that there has been also a specialrevelation unique in its significance and value for thehuman race. The justification for such a claim may bebriefly sketched.

(i) It would seem that for excellence in any humanpursuit concentration of effort and consequent limitationof interest were necessary. It is therefore not inherentlyimprobable that one nation should be more concernedabout the things of the spirit than another, even that inone nation there should be such predominance of religionas marked it out from all other peoples. It is generallyconceded that in the life of the Hebrew nation religionfilled a larger place than in the life of any other nation.Its prophetic succession was the one distinction thatamong the other nations excelling it in the manifold giftsof culture, and arts of civilisation, it could claim. If itbe said that it was endowed with a unique genius forreligion, that does not dispose of the claim that it enjoyeda unique revelation, for, as has already been shown,


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38 A HAOT)BOOK OF APOLOGETICS [on.implies revelation ; it involves a contact with andcommunication from God such as no other human pursuit

does ; the greater the human receptivity of religion thegreater the divine communicativeness of revelation.

(ii) Yet when we look more closely at the history as it isunfolded in trustworthy records, what we do find is notso much a spontaneous interest in, and a voluntary con-centration on, religion, as a constraint of divine providence,and an influence of teachers conscious of heing God'smessengers, which kept the people, prone to stray, in thisnarrow path of the divine appointing. The religion ofany people is affected by the manifold conditions of itslife ; the thought of God is determined by the knowledgeof self and world possessed ; and there has been a tendencyin many religions to decadence rather than to progress.In the Hebrew nation we find this same tendency underthe same influences ; but it is counteracted in the twoways already indicated, in historical events and propheticmonitions.

(Hi) It is not at all unreasonable to accept the accountthat the religion

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