The Coming of a Literal Christ.
By Editor
WE love the holy Scriptures; we love their truths and their promises. All are very precious to our hearts. We love to vindicate them because they are the words given in mercy by our heavenly Father, and because they are our only hope—the only hope of the world. We have staked all on their integrity, on the certainty of their promises. If these fail, then our hope is lost; then we could look forward to nothing but endless darkness. We have relinquished the hopes, the treasures, the ambitions of this world, and rested all on the Bible. If it disappoints our faith and hopes, then are we truly miserable. But many will consent to these words, and assert their confidence in the Scriptures in terms equally strong, whose faith and hope are essentially different from ours. Do the Scriptures teach different faiths, and lay different foundations for different hopes? They do not. The apostle says there is "one faith," and "one hope of your calling." Eph. 4:4, 5. Also that the word he preached was not yea and nay, but all the promises of God are yea and amen. Yet with the same profession of faith in the Bible, these diversities of faith exist. This being so, the question of our Saviour seems always pertinent,— It is a truth which cannot be disputed that a person can read his feelings into anything in which he takes a deep interest. Could we go back forty years, and submit the Constitution of the United States to two able jurists, one raised and educated in Massachusetts and the other in South Carolina, they would come to widely different conclusions in regard to its teaching and its intention. This is not the fault of the Constitution; it does not read one way in Massachusetts and another way in South Carolina. The difference in their conclusions is owing entirely to the difference in their education and their surroundings. They read with their prepossessions all alive to discover something there which they wish to find there. They are ready to magnify every intimation in their favor, and to depreciate every proof which may stand against them. In a word, they make the document reflect their own feelings and prepossessions. And it is just so with the Bible. It was a shrewd remark of Gerret Smith that he had noticed that people seldom read the Bible to learn what they ought to do; they first make up their minds what they wish to do, and then read the Bible to find something to justify them in doing it. In this spirit they can easily read their feelings into the Bible, and then persuade themselves that they are acting conscientiously and religiously. This is a very wrong, yet a very common method of reading the Scriptures. Again, many people read the Bible without any just regard to the laws of evidence, and then rest with great complacency on their conclusions, which, they imagine, are as certain as that the Bible is true. They will ignore a positive statement, and accept the merest inference as good and sufficient proof, because the inference favors their feelings or their prejudices, and the positive proof does not. And when such come together and compare their faiths, they really imagine that you can prove anything by the Bible,—as you certainly can by their rule of evidence, or rather according to their accepted violations of all the laws of evidence. The Bible is not singular in this respect. Any other book or document can be used the same way with the same result, as we have instanced in the case of the United States Constitution. A believer in Spiritualism, with whom we were conversing on the state of the dead, and of their ability or inability to "communicate" with us, said: "Anything can be proved by the Bible; you can prove your theory, and I can prove mine." Of course we dissented from this, and at once offered to test the matter. We proposed that each should give his proof, quoting only those texts which contain plain, positive statements, passing those from which only inferences can be drawn. And we began, quoting this text: "The living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything." Although we could have given other positive proofs, the contest ended right there; for the opposite side had no plain, positive statement to offer. We refused to admit texts from which it was inferred that the opposite was true until the positive proof was exhausted. Inferences may be highly satisfactory under certain circumstances, but never when they conflict with positive statements on the same subject. Yet many, as before said, draw inferences in direct contradiction of positive statements, and then consider their faith both strong and good as long as they tenaciously cling to their conclusions. Were such a rule of evidence admitted in our courts, there would be no courts of justice. Criminal trials would be a farce. Yet many risk their cases in the Court of Heaven—the Court of infinite justice—on this false rule. This is a very bad method of reading the Scriptures. It perverts everything which it touches. Another wrong method of reading the Bible is to give the words a mystical signification, which is called spiritualizing the Scriptures. In this method the meaning of words as given in the lexicons is not admitted, but in their stead every conceivable imaginary meaning is accepted. All that is necessary to expound the Scriptures according to this method is a lively imagination; or, if "great spirituality" is desired, a wild fancy. There is no system to this method, unless it be comprised in this one rule—never believe that the Bible means just what it says. It is reckless in method and results. Akin to the above, though not necessarily so fanciful, is the adopting of a false method of interpreting the prophecies. This method has an overshadowing influence on the whole system of theology of him who adopts it. We say it is akin to the method just previously mentioned; for, as that does, it discards what is (properly) called "the literal interpretation" of the prophecies and the prophetic symbols, and of all parables and figures in the Scriptures. But we insist that there is no other interpretation but the literal. Any other is no interpretation in fact. To prove this we will examine what we will call a representative statement of an advocate of this method of reading the Scriptures. We call it thus for good reasons: (1) It was made by a man who writes D. D. after his name; (2) It was published in the Interior, an influential paper of an influential denomination; (3) It well expresses the views of all those who advocate what they call the "spiritual interpretation." His remarks were founded on Dan. 2:35, especially the latter part: "And the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth." Now his argument was this: If we accept the literal interpretation, we must believe that at some future time the surface of the whole earth will be covered with rock; but that being absurd, it follows that the literal interpretation cannot be admitted. We will show the absurdity of his argument before we attempt to show the fallacy of his conclusions. It is generally supposed that a man who carries the title of D. D., must have some (if not superior) advantages and qualifications as an expounder of the Scriptures. And we may also say that it is reasonable to suppose that the editor of a representative religious paper must be able to understand the theology of his denomination, and have such an oversight of the contents of his journal as to make them conform to their standard of the truth. And therefore we must express our great surprise that a man who carries the title of D. D. should write such an evident absurdity as that noticed above, and that such a paper as the Interior should sanction it and give it currency. We can account for it only by the fact that it is their system of interpretation. We readily concede that his conclusion would be legitimate if the statement of the text were to be taken literally; but for this nobody contends. To take a figure or symbol literally, is one thing, and to give it a literal interpretation is quite another thing. The truth is, that to take it literally, as the writer in the Interior has done, is to shut out all idea of interpretation. A rock is literally a rock, as all will confess; but "a rock" is no interpretation of "a rock," when the word is used as a symbol. We might ask what could lead this D. D. and the editor of this paper to put before the world such an absurd statement, so evidently in violation of the laws of language; but we will rather ask, Can that system be true which rests upon such violations of the plainest laws of language? We assure the reader that it is with the deepest feelings of reverence for the truth of God, and of pity for the souls who are being misled by false reasonings, that we have undertaken to write on this subject. It is our earnest desire to vindicate the integrity of the message sent from Heaven by our merciful Father, the very essence and life of which is being assailed by mystifying processes.