Protestantism Drifting by G. B. Thompson

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Mar 21, 1911

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 38, No. 12.

Protestantism Drifting

By G. B. Thompson

II. Departure from the Faith

We hesitate somewhat to speak of the departure of professed Protestantism from the original platform of "the Bible and the Bible only" as the rule of faith, lest we be misunderstood. Conscious of our own frailties, we have little disposition to sit as a critic on others. But conscious also of our responsibility as a watchman, we dare not sit still and hold our peace when danger is impending. Were it not for this we would maintain silence now. But when infidelity dresses up in sacerdotal paraphernalia, and enters the synagog of the most high God, and with lordly mien, subtle and mysterious reasonings, and philosophical speculations, claims to be the Gospel of the Son of God, and begins the work of destroying faith in the Word of God, and blasting the hopes of those who have hitherto trusted in the Bible as a revelation from God to man, it is not a virtue to be commended to sit idly by, like a coward, while mankind is dragged into the seething Niagara of unbelief.

Ingersoll, the noted infidel, is reported to have said before his death that he did not need to lecture against the Bible any longer, for the reason that the preachers had gone at it. This is a serious indictment, and yet we are forced to confess with sorrow that to some extent it is the truth. Not that all are guilty as charged; far from it. But the professed exponents of "Higher Criticism," and of "science falsely so called," are found in many pulpits, in schools and theological seminaries, as editors of Bible dictionaries and of strong religious journals. While not desiring to sow more widely the seeds of doubt and skepticism taught under the garb of Christianity, and by professed Protestant leaders and ministers who claim the Bible as their rule of faith, yet it is necessary that some of their statements, some of this "fruit of Sodom," be laid before the reader, that he may judge for himself.

In the Homiletic Review of November, 1909, an article is published from the pen of the Rev. S. W. Blunt, of Nottingham, England, entitled "What Have the Cities Given Us?" He says:

The last fifty years have seen a very remarkable change. I doubt if many could now be found to argue in the old-fashioned way; I doubt if the sturdiest opponent of Biblical criticism would dare to assert that we may take our rules at haphazard from the Old Testament, without modifying or rectifying them by reference to the Christian standard.

That is to say, we dare not follow the Bible as it reads, until it has been interpreted and rectified by a "Christian standard." By a "Christian standard" he means, of course, the opinions of some unbelieving Bible critics. Again he says:

Many of the books of the Old Testament are not, in their present form, by the reputed authors; for example, most of the Pentateuch can not be by Moses, . . . while to the works of the prophets there have been many additions made by later writers. We shall at once be inclined to say that if this be so the Old Testament contains a great deal of sheer impudent forgery. But this is a complete mistake. Forgery implies the intention to deceive; and such an intention did not enter the minds of those Jews who passed their own writings under some great man's name.

The advance of knowledge, moreover, has shown that much of the earlier part of the Old Testament is legend or tradition, not strictly accurate history.

Is the foregoing true Protestantism, an appeal to the integrity of the Bible? No, indeed; it is infidelity. Convince a man that there are some "forgeries," "legends," or "traditions" in the Bible, and he does not know for sure where they are, in which chapter, verse, or book they may be found, and this serves to cloud with doubt the whole Bible. This is the work of infidelity.

Dr. Lyman Abbott, one of the foremost lights and leading clergymen of the present time, in the Outlook of August 20, 1907, expressed himself, editorially, as follows:

Popular opinion, gradually imbibing its ideas from literary scholars, is learning that the Bible is a collection of Hebrew law, history, and literature; that it is to be studied and interpreted as other collections of literature; that it grew up as other collections of literature have grown up; that an infallible book is an impossibility.

This "Higher Critic" simply places the Bible on a level with other books, and teaches that it should be reined up to the bar of human reason just the same as "other collections of literature," and that it is not an infallible guide. This teaching is not that of true Protestantism; it is akin to Catholicism. It is the belief of the Roman Church as expressed by Cardinal Gibbons. He says: "A rule of faith, or a competent guide to heaven, must be able to instruct in all the truths necessary for salvation. Now the Scriptures alone do not contain all the truths which a Christian is bound to believe, nor do they explicitly enjoin all the duties which he is obliged to practise."

What a wide departure is here witnessed from the Protest of the Princes, which declared that the Bible "is the sure rule of all doctrine." The following, taken from the Syracuse (New York) Journal of March 7, 1899, is significant:

At the regular weekly meeting of Methodist ministers of New York, the proposition "that the inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible are no longer possible of belief among reasoning men" was advanced in a paper read by the Rev. S. P. Cadman, pastor of the Metropolitan Temple. Mr. Cadman pointed out alleged discrepancies, and asserted that the time had come when people could find truth only at its fountainhead, Christ. At the conclusion of Mr. Cadman's paper, the four hundred ministers present applauded him.

Picture the scene if you can. Four hundred so-called Protestant ministers, pastors of large congregations in the city, clapping their hands in applause and endorsement of a claim by one of their number, that God's Word is full of mistakes! We can scarcely credit the report. We might expect such a scene at the weekly gathering of a secular league, or an infidel club, but hardly in a large body of preachers, the professed friends of the Bible. How much faith can we reasonably expect to find in the congregations over which such pastors preside? Does the Syracuse meeting stand alone in its infidelity? The late Wm. R. Harper, Ph.D., late president of Chicago University, was an eminent Higher Critic. The Chicago Herald of Jan. 29, 1894, reports him as saying in a lecture:

The story of the murder of Abel by his brother Cain is a myth. It is no more the truth as far as we know than the myth of the capture of Troy by a wooden horse, or the foundation of Rome by Romulus and Remus.

The Christian Register of June, 1891, tho in harmony with Higher Criticism, is forced to say:

Thomas Paine, tho stigmatized and set aside as an infidel, finds reincarnation in the modern Bible critic. Paine pointed out the contradictions in the Bible which render impossible the claim that it is an infallible book. He lived too far in advance of his age. The spirit of modern scientific criticism had not come. Now it is interesting to find that with a different spirit, and with different tools, . . . the professors in our theological seminaries are doing again the work which Paine did.

"Paine reincarnated!" With "different tools" doing the "same work" he did! What an awful indictment, and from the camp of the Higher Critics! We commend this to their sober consideration. No man whose heart has been transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the Word, will be found placing the Bible on a level with other books, or believing a doctrine that "reincarnates" Thomas Paine. A study of the Bible changes men's hearts; but not so with other books. Who ever heard of a drunkard or a thief being redeemed by a study of some science, like geology, or mathematics? Studying a dictionary does not cause the passions of the heart to subside. But millions are ready to testify that the study of the Bible has done this for them.

Dr. Reuben A. Torrey, at the close of a sermon on unbelief, said, "I want to ask every man who has been saved from intemperance, or other sins, to stand up." Nearly a thousand men arose to their feet. Continuing, he said: "I want to be fair! I want any unbeliever who has been saved from his intemperance by his infidelity to stand." Back under the gallery a man was struggling to his feet. Torrey said, "Stand up and tell it out, my man; how did your unbelief save you?" But the man beside him said, "He can't tell it; he's drunk."

It was a belief in the Bible, and the Bible only, as a rule of faith, that lifted the world out of the gloom of the Dark Ages, by bringing to sinners a power, through faith in God's Word, that would save them from sin. Now when this holy Book is taken by its professed friends, by Protestant expositors, and placed on a level with the tomes of ancient lore written by man without divine illumination, there is nothing for the world, but to lapse again into a darkness and gloom more dense than before.

Further evidence that Protestantism is drifting from the foundation laid at the Diet of Spires in 1529 must be reserved for other articles.