THE AUTHORITY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.
By Samuel T. Spear
THE readers of the Bible should always keep in mind that the term "Scripture" or "Scriptures," when occurring in the New Testament, refers to the sacred writings existing among the Jews at the time of Christ, by them regarded as of divine authority, and among Christians now spoken of as the Old Testament, and by them accepted as a part of the Word of God. The manner in which Christ and his apostles treated these writings is a matter of no little importance to the Christian, in this age, or in any age, in determining in what light he should regard them. If they accepted them as of divine authority, then we have in this fact, not only a safe, but a conclusive rule for our guidance. Nothing is clearer, in the New Testament, than that Christ, in the days of his flesh, had frequent occasion to refer to the Scriptures, and that, in doing so, he placed upon them the seal of his own indorsement, as a whole, and in various parts, often quoting from them to confirm his own teaching, not infrequently explaining them, always implying their divine authority, and never suggesting the remotest doubt on this point. Alluding to them as a whole, he said to the Jews: "Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me." The record of the interview with the two disciples on the day of his resurrection, when they were going to the village of Emmaus, contains the following words: "And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." He met his apostles in the evening of the same day, and said to them: "These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me." It is said that "then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures." He told the Jews before his death that he had not come "to destroy the law or the prophets," but rather to fulfill them. The language of Christ in regard to the flood is an example of a specific reference to a portion of the Old Testament Scriptures. These are his words:— "But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." The book of Genesis gives an account of the flood in the days of Noah; and here Christ sets his seal to the truth of that account. He who denies the occurrence of such a flood, and the destruction of the race thereby, with the exception of those saved in the ark, assumes to be wiser than the great Teacher. He rejects what Christ accepted as true. Christ, beyond all question, did commit himself to the divine authority of the Old Testament. There never was a word of dispute between him and the Jews on this point. Precisely the same attitude was assumed by his apostles; and of this fact we have a general statement in the following words of Paul to Timothy:— "But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." Paul here stamps the Jewish Scriptures, referred to collectively, with the signet of his own authority, and in the most express manner declares them to be stamped with the signet of God's authority. For three Sabbath days in succession he reasoned with the Jews at Thessalonica, "out of the Scriptures," assuming their divine authority, and showing therefrom that the Jesus whom he preached was Christ. So, also, the same apostle, having in the first and second chapters of his epistle to the Romans declared Jews and Gentiles to be alike sinners and condemned by the law of God, supposes a Jew to ask this question: "What advantage then hath the Jew, or what profit is148there in circumcision?" His answer is the following: "Much every way; chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God." There is no doubt that he here refers to the Old Testament Scriptures as a whole, of which he speaks as "the oracles of God," without any distinction between different parts. The Scriptures, or oracles of God, of which Paul spoke, and from which he reasoned, included the five books of Moses; and in the first of these books we have an account of the creation of the world, of Adam and Eve as the primitive ancestors of the human race, of their temptation and fall in the garden of Eden, and of the introduction of death among men. This account is a part of the "all Scripture" that was "given by the inspiration of God;" and to it Paul was no stranger. What he thought of it appears in the following references to it:— "Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." "For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. . . . And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul. . . . The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from Heaven." "For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression." "But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." These are the words of a man who claimed to have been taught "by the revelation of Jesus Christ," and to speak in the words "which the Holy Ghost teacheth," and whom the Christian world accepts as the great inspired expounder of Christianity. It is impossible not to see that in the passages above quoted, he refers to the creation and fall of Adam and Eve, as stated in the book of Genesis. There was in his mind an Adam and an Eve, who were the first parents of the race. . . . To say that he simply used current Jewish notions without intending to indicate his own faith in respect to them, is not only an assumption without a particle of evidence to support it, but also discreditable to his sincerity and honesty. If he really believed as he wrote, but was entirely mistaken, as some endeavor to show, then what becomes of his inspiration, and indeed of all his teaching as an apostle? This is a question for those to answer who reject the record which Paul accepted as true. The fourth chapter of Genesis gives an account of the murder of Abel by Cain, both of whom are described as the sons of Adam and Eve. In the first epistle of John we find an exhortation to love one another, followed by these words: "Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous." This shows that John knew the history in Genesis, and believed the facts there detailed, with regard to these two sons of Adam and Eve. Paul, moreover, makes a reference to these facts in the following words: "By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and by it he being dead yet speaketh." Still further, Jesus Christ himself refers to this very Abel, saying: "That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar." These words of Christ recognize the history given in Genesis in regard to "the blood of righteous Abel," and assume the truth of that history. Were Paul and John and Jesus Christ alike in error in respect to this history? The infidel may say this, but it will hardly do for the Christian to imitate his example. Jude, in his epistle, speaks of Enoch as "the seventh from Adam," implying both an Enoch and an Adam, and clearly referring to the record of both as we find it in the book of Genesis. Paul, in his epistle to the Hebrews, cites this Enoch, who was "the seventh from Adam," as one of his examples of faith: "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him; for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God." So, according to Genesis, there was a Noah and also a flood; and this Noah, in connection with the flood, furnishes another example of faith, as cited in the epistle to the Hebrews. These examples of faith are based on the history given in Genesis, and are no examples at all, but mere fancy-work, if that history be not true. Luke, in giving the genealogy of Jesus of Nazareth, goes back to Adam, and there stops with all human ancestors, and speaks of Adam as "the son of God," meaning that Adam had no human father, but was himself the first man, as described in Genesis. Adam, according to Luke, was not the product of a protoplasm, fully grown, nor the lineal descendent of a monkey, but was "the son of God" by direct creation; and this is just what Moses says about him. We thus see that the New Testament, in the words of Christ, and in the writings of his apostles, places the stamp of its own authority upon the Old Testament, including the writings of Moses. If we accept and believe the former, we must also accept and believe the latter. This indorsement of the latter by the former ought, with Christians, to be the end of the question in respect to the divine authority of the Old Testament. Such teachers as Christ and his apostles are not to be set aside or corrected by any uninspired human wisdom. There are, however, some scientists who profess to have discovered that the Mosaic account of the origin of man is not correct, that the race did not begin as described in the book of Genesis, and that at least the earlier parts of this book are not to be regarded as historical, but rather as legends or fables which Moses or somebody else incorporated therein. What shall the Christian do with these scientists? The answer is that, if he is a scientist himself, he may reason with them, if he chooses, upon the merits of the question as one of simple science, and that whether he does so or not, he should not hesitate a moment to accept as true that which has the indorsement of Christ and his apostles, especially as the scientists, so-called, are at almost an infinite distance from certainty as to what they affirm, and what they deny. Their theory, taken at its best, does not rise much, if at all, above a mere conjecture on a subject in respect to which every man, except as taught by a revelation from God, must necessarily be profoundly ignorant. A Christian pays a very poor compliment to the Bible, and to his own faith in it, when he starts out with the assumption that on such a subject science is the fixed point of certainty, and that the Bible is the variable point of uncertainty, and that if there be any seeming conflict between the two, the Bible must yield to the supreme authority of science. This, in respect to the matter involved, is giving to science more honor than it deserves, and to the Bible far less honor than it deserves. What Christ thought and Paul thought about the Mosaic record is a much better guide, to the Christian, as to what he shall think, than any scientist that ever lived or died. Christ and his apostles treated it as a true record; and this fact, though not enough for an infidel, ought to be enough for everyone, whether learned or unlearned, who believes in him and in the inspiration of his apostles. It is not possible to rest our faith upon a higher or more reliable authority. We must trust Christ and his apostles in respect to the great doctrine of our salvation. Why not trust them in every other matter to which they have affixed their signet?—Samuel T. Spear, D. D., in Independent.