UNCONCEALED INFIDELITY by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Mar 10, 1887

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 13, No. 10.

UNCONCEALED INFIDELITY.

By Editor

By this term we do not refer to the blasphemous rantings of Ingersoll, but to the infidelity that is preached from Christian pulpits and scattered broadcast by the religious press. There is scarcely a Bible doctrine, or a fact of sacred history that is not positively denied by some professing to be religious teachers. The Bible says that in six days God created the heaven and the earth; but that truth has been so long and so generally denied by religious teachers, that he who believes the simple Bible statement, is considered an old fogy. To believe the simple statement of the Bible is considered a mark of ignorance. Our attention has been especially directed to this matter of late by several noted instances of clerical infidelity, a few of which we will notice.

An English clergyman has recently published two books on "Christ and Christianity," in one of which, entitled "A Picture of Jesus," the following version is given of the miracle at Cana:—

"The Virgin is evidently a little discomposed. The run on the wine is, no doubt, due to the people who came in the retinue of her Son. She cannot bear that members of her own family should put to shame the giver of the feast and so close a friend. 'They have no wine, my dear Son—you see there are too many, in consequence of—' 'Hush!' Jesus stops her, with exquisite sensibility and gentle courtesy. He will not have attention called to the fact of there being any deficiency.

"No doubt Jesus and his disciples had brought wine enough, at least for themselves, according to custom. But now, is it not possible—even likely and Christlike—that with loving thoughtfulness, and knowing the extra concourse in consequence of his presence, Jesus may have said to his disciples, 'If we go, we must not be burdensome to our friends; they are not rich; many will follow us; the sacred rites of hospitality, by which at such a season none may be excluded, must not be put to shame; take plenty of wine, and let it be good—the best wine. But don't let it be known; we must not do a kindness to get praise by others, at the expense of wounding our host's feelings; let us so manage that, if possible, he may not even know that his wine ran short; let us leave our supply outside, it need only be used if called for, and then served up out of the host's own pots. The water pots at the door are sure to be empty by that time, it will be most convenient to put our wine in them at the right moment, and no one will be likely to notice that it is not the host's own wine.'

"So when the wine 'runs short,' Jesus himself steals away from the feast—the servants quickly get in the wine, fill up the water pots under his directions—and the whole had been done so quietly that the first thing noticed is that wine is being poured out of pots usually containing water. Some noticed that; the servants, we are told, knew about it, and could have given the real explanation; but the ruler of the feast did not even know that the wine had failed; he only noticed that what was now served was the best wine."

The above was written by one who writes "Rev." before his name; and we have seen it printed in a prominent denominational journal, without a word of dissent. Instead of being called a picture of Jesus, his book should have been entitled "a Caricature of Jesus." For no one who has ever read the simple narrative in the second chapter of John, could believe that the one who wrote the paragraph above had any other motive than to ridicule the Bible account. The evangelist plainly states that the servants, at the command of Jesus, filled the six stone water-pots, and as plainly states that that water was made wine; yet this man professing to give a picture of Jesus, has represented him as using deception in order to perpetrate a very clumsy trick. It is not simply that the miracle is denied, but Jesus is represented as being actually dishonest. No professed infidel ever did more to bring the Bible into disrepute by his coarse jokes upon it, than has this professed minister of the gospel. We cannot believe that a man who presents Jesus in such a light as he does, can have any faith in him or in the Bible.

In its issue of December 9, the Christian Union reprints an article from the Popular Science Monthly, which begins thus: "There is no weed weedier or more ubiquitous than the common thistle. In Paradise, it is true, if we may trust John Milton and the Sunday-school books—wise, as usual, beyond what is written—there were no thorns or thistles." The one who wrote that has read the Bible to little purpose, if he has read it at all, or else he doesn't accept the Bible as final authority on any subject. The Bible says that at the close of creation, "God saw everything that he had made, and, behold it was very good." Gen. 1:31. Thorns and thistles are not good. Also we are told that "out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food." Gen. 2:9. And the growth of thorns and thistles is expressly declared to have been the direct consequence of the sin of our first parents: "And unto Adam he [God] said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it; cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee." Gen. 3:17, 18. It would be well if many who nowadays presume to write upon Bible subjects had as much knowledge of the Bible as John Milton had; better still if they believed it as fully as he did. The quotation which implies that thistles grew from the beginning, and were in Eden, is perfectly in keeping with the rapidly-increasing tendency to leave God out of the account altogether, and to hold that the world evolved itself.

Again, in the Christian Union of January 20, the editor, Lyman Abbott, makes an exhibition of infidelity in his comments on the current Sunday-school lesson. The lesson is upon the call of Abram, Gen. 12:1-9, and is entitled "The Faith of Abram." We make a few quotations from the article:—

"And so he went out, 'not knowing,' says the author of the epistle to the Hebrews, 'whither he went;' not knowing, I may add, by whom he was led. He went by faith, obedient to the command of that inward sense which is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen. He crossed the Euphrates, passed over the desert, and entered the unknown land which he determined should be his home. He pitched his tent and built an altar near to what afterward became Bethel; and initiated his entrance in a new country by a new worship. He called, it is said, upon the name of the gods. In treating this ancient history we are almost wholly in the land of conjecture; the conjecture is reasonable that he first introduced into use, and so into the Hebrew Scriptures, the plural from Elohim, the gods, as a method of expressing his faith that the many lords and gods of the Chaldaic religion were but different names or expressions for the one God who is the Master and Maker of all. As Paul commended the altar to the unknown God, and whom the Athenians unknowingly worshipped proceeded to declare unto them, so Abraham, not attacking even by implication the polytheistic beliefs of his father's house, grouped in thought all the gods of the earth and the heavens together, and took the first step toward a true monotheistic worship by calling on the name of the gods, as though in the many he would recognize but One."

Some persons may see in the above a sample of advanced theology, but we can see only a sample of advanced infidelity. The Scripture says, "Abraham believed God;" Lyman Abbott says that Abraham was not sure that there was any God. The Scripture tells us the simple facts about the call of Abraham, where he was when he was called, how old he was, where he went, and where he stopped on the way, and the instances connected with his journey; Lyman Abbott says, "In treating this ancient history we are almost wholly in the land of conjecture." We submit that the only room there is for conjecture is by ignoring the Bible narrative. The writer of the above conjectures that because the word "Elohim" is used (not however by Abraham, but by Moses, the historian), therefore Abraham had the gods of Chaldea in mind when he built the altar and worshiped at Bethel. He might as reasonably conjecture that Moses had the many gods of the Egyptians in mind when he wrote, "In the beginning God [Elohim] created the heavens and the earth."

But the writer continues:—

"Of course I am well aware that there are able theological writers who suppose that modern theology was furnished to Adam in Eden, and to Abraham in Ur, and to whom this whole rendering of Abraham's emigration will seem secular, if not profane. To them the plural Elohim is an evidence that Abraham believed in the Trinity, and his erection of an altar a conclusive proof that he comprehended the atonement. If religion is something external to man, we may certainly conceive it prepared ready-made and given to him, like the dress of skins which the Lord God made for Adam and Eve in the garden. But if religion is character, if it is what man is, not what he has, then, in the crude and ruder states of human development, religion must be simple and crude in its forces; then, as we are content to teach our children the very simplest truths concerning God, and their duty toward him, and their right of trust in him, so we not only may, but we must, think God has taught the race."

The trouble is that his theory does not allow that God is the author of religion. In fact, it ignores God entirely. Instead of allowing that God is the teacher of the race, it makes man his own teacher, and religion something that is evolved from his own inner consciousness. If religion is not something external to man, then it is only human and not divine. The Bible says that "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God;" but the writer of the above paragraph, in claiming that religion is something that is developed within the individual man, being crude at first, but becoming more perfect as the man becomes better educated, does away entirely with the necessity for a God. His theory is infidelity pure and simple.

To show that this charge is well founded, and that the editor of the Christian Union has in his comments entirely ignored God, we make one more quotation:—

"So perhaps from this simple story we may get a simple and clear idea of what is that calling and election which has been a theological trouble to so many minds. Abraham was the first in the long line of God's 'chosen people;' and he is himself designated in the Bible as 'called' and 'chosen.' We are called whenever we feel within an inspiration to a higher life or to some special divine action; we make our calling and election sure when we are obedient to the voice divine.

"To listen to and obey this voice is faith. Abraham 'believed in the Lord, and he counted it to him for righteousness.' Abraham's creed at this time, if I have read his story correctly, must have been of the simplest kind. He could have believed in no Bible, for he had none; in no divine, atoning Saviour, for he had apparently been told of none; there is nothing to indicate that he knew anything about the future state, nor anything more about God than a general conviction that Elohim was one, not many. He knew less than the Magi who followed the star. But, like them, he followed. His inward convictions were very few; what they revealed to him was very simple; but he followed them whithersoever they might lead him."

We have in the above at least one direct contradiction of the Bible. Paul says (Gal. 3:8, 17) that the gospel was preached to Abraham, and that the covenant that God made with him was confirmed in Christ; Lyman Abbott says that Abraham had no belief in a divine atonement, because he had been told of none. But even worse than this is his theory of the call of God, and his comment on the statement that Abraham believed God. His call, we are told, was simply inward inspiration; and his faith was simply obedience to the promptings of his own heart.

The Bible says that "Abraham believed God and it was accounted unto him for righteousness;" but we are told that what he believed was simply an impulse from within; therefore we must conclude if we accept Dr. Abbott's theory, that the God that Abraham worshiped was himself; and that his faith being accounted to him for righteousness was simply his own self-approval! This is the doctrine of Spiritualists and infidels. We never pick up a Spiritualist paper that does not counsel its readers to follow the promptings of their own heart. If following one's inward convictions wherever they may lead him, with no regard for a supernatural revelation, were what is meant by faith, then there would be multitudes of people upon earth who could truly claim to be children of faithful Abraham. But that is not faith; nothing is faith except obedience to the plainly expressed will of God.

It is a matter of very little importance what any single individual believes. We have no controversy with Lyman Abbott. If he wishes to believe that the Bible is a myth, he has that privilege, but we cannot help feeling righteously indignant when we think that such stuff as we have quoted is sent out to the tens of thousands of Sunday-school scholars, many of whom will accept it as legitimate comment upon the Scripture. It is a terrible pity that honest students of the Bible cannot be allowed to receive the pure and unadulterated word of God.

The blindness and infidelity concerning the Scriptures that we find among men in high position, is simply appalling. Yet people will say, "If the seventh day and not the first is the Sabbath, why have not these learned ministers of the gospel found it out and preached it?" We reply, If the Bible is the inspired word of God, why have not these men found it out and why do they not preach it, instead of teaching their own vain imaginations? When a man can pervert simple Bible history as has been done in the quotations we have made, it is not surprising that he cannot see a scriptural duty which interferes with his convenience. And yet these men, notwithstanding their unconcealed infidelity, will be blindly followed by thousands. W.