We Admit the Charge by L. A. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Aug 11, 1904

We Admit the Charge

By L. A. S.

IN a paper read before a recent conference of Baptist ministers in Detroit, and “published by request” in the Michigan Christian Herald, the Rev. W. L. Munger attempts to set forth “the human element in the Scriptures.” He says that in some particulars God “left the writers of the Scriptures to their own resources,” the result being that in those particulars their writings show the imperfections of the human mind, and the Scripture statements penned by them fall short of the truth. Historical and scientific inaccuracies abound in the writings of the Old Testament, he says. The Lord allowed the Old Testament writers to mix in with his revelation of truth to mankind, crude errors reflecting the ignorance of the times in which they wrote, etc.

As an illustration of the “errors” of the Old Testament writings, he cites such texts as Ps. 6:5 (“In death there is no remembrance of Thee”); Ps. 31:17 (“Let the wicked . . . be silent in sheol”); Eccl. 9:10 (“There is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in sheol”); Isa. 38:17-19 (“The grave can not praise thee, death can not celebrate thee”), and others teaching unconsciousness in death, and adds: “The Adventists, taking these scriptures as an adequate and final expression of Scripture teaching, have drawn from them the doctrine of soul sleeping.”

We plead guilty to the charge. We, Seventh-day Adventists, do take these and all other portions of both the Old and the New Testament writings as being “adequate and final expressions of Scripture teaching;” and if in holding such a view of the Scriptures we show ourselves to be different from the Baptists and the whole religious world besides, then we are willing to be so distinguished.

We believe that Peter was right in saying that the “holy men of old” who penned the Old Testament Scriptures did not write of their own will or of their own knowledge, but that they “spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter 1:21); and that Paul told the truth in the statement that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, . . . that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” 2 Tim. 3:16, 17. Whatever others may think of it, it is clear to us that a man can not be made perfect by a means that is imperfect. God does not feed us on imperfection, and then expect us to be “perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”

If the Scriptures as given to us in the Bible are not the infallible word of God, but merely contain that Word mixed with fallible human ideas, then either some council of learned men must decide for the rest of us what is true and what is false in the Word, or each one of us must decide this for himself, and in either case the judgment is only human and fallible, and we should have infallibility resting upon fallibility,—a thing which obviously could not be. The Scripture selected by us as being “given by inspiration of God,” would be infallible provided our fallible judgment about it was correct! What kind of “infallibility” would such scriptures possess, and what would such “infallibility” amount to?

We naturally choose to believe those scriptures which harmonize best with our own views and inclinations, and to doubt those which cut squarely across our own preferences, and to conform with which would require the greatest change in our lives. Hence it would naturally happen that we would select as inspired those portions of the scriptures which we need the least, and reject those which we need the most. In that way we should make slow progress indeed toward salvation. L. A. S.