Note and Comment

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 4, 1909

Philosophy or the Word?

MANY influential religious journals are exalting science, or philosophy, to a place of greater eminence than the plain Word of God. This is not done by direct assertion, but the result accomplished is the same as if it were. The most vital declarations and principles of the Bible are made to conform to the findings, or accepted speculations, of men, often of those who are declaredly antagonistic to the Word of God. The thing that does the conforming must be greater than the thing that is conformed by it, just as the power which transforms, or alters, a law is greater than the law upon which it operates. To accept the teachings of Darwin in reference to the origin of man, and still claim to be a believer in the Bible, means that we have given an interpretation to the Bible which completely nullifies its plainest declarations of fact, and makes confusion of its whole purpose. Of such a character is an editorial utterance in the Northwestern Christian Advocate of February 3, speaking of Darwin, Carlyle, and Emerson. After declaring that these men were all trained for the pulpit, and through their writings exercised the “profoundest influence on the thought of their generation,” the editor says:—

But at that time the church had no place for them. They were forced to make good their ministry through other channels. Happily, the church is learning that the God she believes in and worships is “wise enough to make all truth-seeking safe, and good enough to make all truth-telling useful.”

That puts the teachings of these philosophers by direct statement on a par with the work of the ministry, and by logical conclusion above the Word wherever their teachings and that of the Word disagree. It is a remarkable development that has come to pass when human teachings that undermine the Word of God are exalted to so high an eminence.