Authenticity of the Scriptures by John Norton Loughborough

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 20, 1864

Authenticity of the Scriptures.

By John Norton Loughborough

CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN ELD. J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH, OF BATTLE CREEK, MICH., AND E. O. DARLING OF ROCKTON, ILLS.

THE following correspondence was commenced in the winter of 1861, but was stopped after my fourth letter. Mr. Darling never responded to letters three and four. I present this correspondence for the Review, hoping it may do some good. Most of the statements of matters of fact are copied from Horne and others, but are greatly condensed in my letters.

J. N. Loughborough.

Mr. Darling's First Letter.

BROTHER: Although I do not lay any particular claim to your friendship, above the claim that each and every individual has one upon another, I take the liberty to address you at this time, and in this manner, for the following reasons: While your tent meetings were in progress at Lee's Grove (Harrison, Ills.), owing to the distance and poor health, I was unable to attend but two, and heard you preach but one evening; but judging from this and from the testimony of those who heard your course, I infer that you dared not only meet the orthodox opposition on their chosen ground and behind their great Theological "earthwork," the Bible, but if I am correctly informed, even invited their officers into your own tent where they might behold "the sword of the Spirit" brandished with such dexterity that they generally, after a few strategic maneuvers, thought it policy to retire rather than risk a general engagement. Judging from all this, I conclude that you at least think that you believe what you profess to believe. This is a compliment I do not, I can not, accord to preachers generally. Believing you are honest, I am anxious to learn the claims, if any, that your philosophy has upon my reason, and obtain a few of the arguments with which you convince and convert a free thinking reasoner to a belief in the infallibility of the Bible, and that yours is the only rational and truthful exposition of the same. Briefly, then, the request I have to make is, that at your earliest convenience, consistent with your other duties, you will, by correspondence in the form of answers to questions, or otherwise if you choose, sustain what, if I understand you, you would probably term, the claims of the Bible.

Yours for a knowledge of the truth.

E. O. Darling.

Rockton, Sept. 10, 1861.

Response.

MR. E. O. DARLING, Dear Sir: Your letter came duly to hand, being forwarded from Davis, Ill., to Battle Creek. The letter did not reach Davis until we had left with the tent. I hope this will be a sufficient excuse for my apparent delay. I don't know but I shall accept your offer to correspond on the authenticity of the Scriptures for a while, at least, if we can get at it in some fair way, and have some just principles by which to try our reasonings. I know of no other way to reason but from cause to effect, and that we cannot do without some principles from which to reason.

Neither can we do it without some standard by which to try our work. You say, in speaking of my book on the Saint's Inheritance, which you are reading, that you cannot "believe anything that is not affirmed, or at least is not contradicted by my reason." I cannot reason without some groundwork on which to reason. I might say a thing does not agree with facts. But to say it does not agree with reason is folly, for reason cannot work without facts to work upon. As Hume says:—"A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence." I am willing you should ask questions, but in answering, I shall ask some questions too. I shall say no more at present, as I am in great haste, and I hope when I receive some of your questions, to be more at liberty. Please address me at Battle Creek at your earliest convenience.

Yours truly,

J. N. Loughborough.

Battle Creek, Sept. 30, 1861.

Mr. Darling's Second Letter.

BRO.: You say you don't know but you shall accept my invitation to correspond "if we can get at it in some fair way, and have some just principles—some standard by which to try our reasoning." Now, while I think that it would be well enough for us, if we can without consuming too much time, to have a few established principles for a foundation, for our eternal welfare, I cannot see the need of any standard outside and besides that standard or principle that judges of standards, the understanding. Or, to state it another way, for us to correspond as I requested, I cannot see why we need any other standard than this, any more than an audience, when you go before it to speak the same matter, subject to the same questioning; unless it be that in that case, "The Book," principles or no principles, is presumed to be the standard, which I suppose is not strictly the case. But I am not too old, nor unwilling to learn more on this subject. What have you to propose here? Referring to a certain portion of my letter, you make me say that "I believed nothing that is not affirmed, or at least is not contradicted by reason," very near as I said it. And then you say that you were not aware that reason itself ever affirmed anything; that you supposed reasoning was "drawing certain conclusions from certain known or inferred causes and facts." Thank you, this definition is undoubtedly correct, but I think also, that if certain conclusions—children of reason—may affirm and confirm, or contradict assertions, it cannot be so very incorrect as to totally obscure the sense to speak of reason as doing it. Here also you seem to take exceptions to the manner in which I refer to your book. But when I said that it "proved little or nothing to me" &c, I supposed that you would readily understand that the reason of this was because it is impossible for me to take as authority, or standard, the mere assertions of Bible writers, to which you almost invariably, as I presume you intended, refer me. If you can get over that standard question, I have some propositions to offer, and would be pleased to hear any from you. I don't see as I can say any more until that standard question is settled, which I trust will receive your attention at your earliest convenience.

Truly yours,

E. O. Darling.

Rockton, Nov. 18, 1861.

Response No. 2.

MR. DARLING, Dear Sir: Your letter of Nov. 18th I received a few days since on returning home from a short trip in Michigan. I embrace this opportunity to answer, although at a late date from the writing of your letter, thinking the old adage true in this case, "Better late than never." You say in regard to my remark about having some standard by which to try our reasoning, "I cannot see that we need any other standard than our own understanding any more than does an audience when you go before it to speak the same matter, subject to the same questioning." I don't know but you are right in this matter. There is, however, a slight difference between this and my preaching to an audience on the same subject. No particular difference between our correspondence and a public discussion on the same subject however. In entering a public discussion, it is necessary for the disputants to understand the source from which their proofs may be derived. But I presume you and I shall have no great difference on that score. I don't know as I just understand your meaning on the subject of standards. You speak of judging all matters by "our understanding." To judge matters by our understanding without any principles or facts, would be equivalent to judging by our impressions. But I will not take advantage of your language, as I suppose you mean we are to judge of matters after getting all the light we can from facts. If you conclude with me, to let the standard question rest for the present as it now stands, we will pass on to the debate. As you first proposed to discuss this matter, saying you wished to ask some questions on the authenticity of the Scriptures, it will be no more than you can expect that I should wait for you to lead out. I trust this will not be construed by you as an unwillingness on my part to try and impart all the light in my power. I of course shall be better prepared to appreciate and help your difficulties when I get your questions, which I suppose, as a matter of course, will involve our points of difference. I trust in the future I shall be able to answer more promptly than heretofore.

I remain yours with respect,

J. N. Loughborough.

Battle Creek, Dec. 19, 1861.

Mr. Darling's Third Letter.

MR. LOUGHBOROUGH, My dear Sir: Yours of Dec. 19th came duly to hand to which I will now reply. As you evince no disposition to protract preliminaries, I will at once proceed to the subject of this correspondence. Passing with you, then, for the present, over the little debate as to whether there is or ought to be any difference between this correspondence and a public discussion of this matter, I will notice for explanation, the next, where, after quoting my language on standards, you say that you don't know as you just understand my meaning when I say that "I cannot see the need of any standard outside of, and besides, that standard which judges all standards—our understanding," and say that to judge of matters by our understanding without any principles or facts, would be almost equivalent to judging by our impressions! But you generously conclude that I mean we are to judge of matters after getting all the light we can from facts, &c. Yes, if we are wise we shall get all the light we can from facts and principles, and make use of it when forming our judgment. But the idea I wished to convey was and is, that before a standard is comprehended by the mind, that mind cannot know whether that standard is true or false, and hence is to us a last and insufficient guide. After that mind comprehends the standard, what better is the standard, even if discovered to be true, to try mental operations by, than the understanding? This, you will perceive, if true at all, is as true of the comparatively unenlightened, as of the enlightened mind.

I will now introduce a very few of the afore mentioned questions. Some of these I have before asked, and heard asked often, and as often have heard them answered by anything but explanations. Hence, I trust you will not think it all unmitigated egotism, should I speak as though I thought some of them inexplicable. First, then, the Bible, its externals. When, where, and how was it compiled? Were these several books, now comprising the Bible, in whole or in part, culled from a collection of manuscripts, and if so, by whom, and what authority? And have we any evidence that these compilers, for the time, at least, were by any means made infallible judges of the matters before them? Were these compilations the work of more than one session, and if it was, when and where the others? And of these manuscripts, how, and where, were they preserved previous to these compilations? In other words, were they, at that time, genuine, and have they, since such compilation, been kept beyond the reach of all possible alteration? Were they, in whole or in part, regarded and used by the people as infallible standards by which to try their reasonings, especially on moral subjects, previous to such compilations?

Next, the Bible, its internals. Is it, as a whole, in its matter, essentially different from any and every other book or books of which we have any knowledge? If so, in what does that difference consist? Was it in a more direct manner than any other book composed by an omniscient, omnipotent and all-good Being, so that in its every narration of fact, and every precept enjoined, it can be depended upon as strictly true, so clear, concise, and plain, that to a moderately well-balanced mind, prior to all theological tinkering, it would be a "safe guide to follow?" In a word, is it, as we generally understand that phrase, "plenarily inspired?" If you say that is so inspired, I of course, can only ask, what and where the evidence? If it is not thus inspired, and is simply a record of, and for, alleged facts and phenomena, then in what sense is it entitled to the appellation of "God's Word," "Holy Bible," &c., any more than is Edmund's Spiritualism, or the Apocrypha to the Old and New Testaments?

These, and similar questions, together with scores of others arising from these, must, I think, of necessity, in every mind, be settled somehow before all doubts can be removed; and all doubts must be removed before a real confiding happiness can be attained. And for that kind of happiness I long and trust and ask prayer of deeds and deep desire of all who wish me well.

Yours with respect,

E. O. Darling.

Rockton, Ill., Jan. 2, 1862.

Response No. 3.

MR. E. O. DARLING, My dear Sir: Your letter of Jan. 2nd is before me, and I hasten to reply. Your preliminaries I have no need to notice, as we have both spoken freely on the subject contained in them.

The first point that arrests my attention is something you say on the standard question again. You say: "The idea I wished to convey was, and is, that before a standard is comprehended by the mind, that mind cannot know whether that standard is true or false; and hence is to us a last and insufficient guide. After that mind comprehends the standard, what better is the standard, even if discovered to be true, to try mental operations by, than the understanding?"

I conceive there is quite a considerable difference. We are dependent for our ideas primarily of everything, on a revelation of some kind: reason itself will never teach us any thing, not even our own name. We must learn it by testimony from others. This becomes more especially the case in reference to events remote from us. Now if I find by carefully trying a book of history, that it records truth on points that I am acquainted with, and succeed in establishing its truthfulness, I take its testimony as true on things which I know nothing about, because I, forsooth, have established it as a true record. It is true, it may take more to convince one man of the truth of a document, than another; but it is not necessary to convince him of the truth of that document, that he should know by actual experience all that is mentioned in the document. If we have established the credibility of a work by the testimony of others writers, whom we may have before proved to be credible, and men of truth, we take the testimony of such men on things of which, by "our own understanding" we know nothing, only what we receive from testimony of others. So, in such a case, that work becomes a standard of facts to us on such subjects as those on which the said work may testify.

But I now come to your question. And I would say,

I am sorry any one should have treated those questions as though they could not be answered. But I know there has been a disposition with some, to meet all such questions with the remark: "Oh, you are an Infidel!" I hope to be able to treat all your questions with candor, and to look them squarely in the face every time. In this letter, I will examine your questions on the externals of the Bible. You ask, "When, where, and how was it compiled? If you mean to ask in this question, when the Old and New Testaments were first bound into one book, I am not prepared to answer your question any further than this, that immediately after this Council of Laodicea (A. D. 364) they were bound into one book. Previous to that time, the New Testament was found in three books, called the Gospel, containing the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John the apostle, containing the Acts, and a part of the epistles we now have. The rest of the books were found in another volume, called the second volume of the apostle, which contained the remaining epistles of our New Testament, and the book of Revelation. Just when they were put into these three divisions, I am not prepared to say now, but as you will see by after testimony, it must have been at a very early date. You are probably aware of the fact that the Ancients had their writings on rolls of parchment, and not in books as we have at the present time, and yet that their writings were always called by them books. See Herodotus, book vi, chap. iv. The Old Testament also existed previous to that Council in three books, called Moses, Psalms, and the Prophets.

But I suppose you mean to ask, when were the books of the Old and New Testaments arranged in the order in which we now have them? I conceive your question to have more especial reference to the credibility of the Bible; for if it was not written till two or three hundred years after the days of Christ, it will materially affect its matters of fact stated. As Paine says: "The first question, however, upon the books of the New Testament, as upon those of the Old, is, are they genuine? Were they written by the persons to whom they are ascribed? For it is upon this ground only, that the strange things related therein have been credited." Age of Reason, Mendum's Boston edition, p. 159. It must have been at a very early date, that the books of the New Testament were arranged. And that early arrangement was the same as that of those which are now regarded as canonical. Eusebius says, that previous to his time, (315) "We find writers giving lists of the books of the New Testament, or rather books which they regarded as sacred." And these lists of books which he refers to, are the same as those now called the New Testament. He says: "These writings were collected and arranged by John the evangelist before his death."

To answer, then, your question, I will commence with the book nearest to our own time, and then take notice of the one more remote. If we show that the New Testament was written in the time of the apostles, and by the apostles, it goes far toward establishing the truth of what we have, professing to be their writings. And especially is this the case if we can get testimony from other writers of the same time, and find that they, instead of contradicting what these books contain, confirm their testimony. Mr. Hobbes, Mr. Chubb, and Lord Bolingbroke, all noted infidels, do not pretend to deny but what Christ lived in the very time in which the New Testament says he lived. As Hobbes says: "The books of the New Testament are as ancient as the times of the apostles; and they were written by persons who lived in those times, some of whom saw the things which they relate." He says still further, that he has "no doubt but the books of the New Testament, as we now have them, are the true registers of those things which were said and done by the apostles and prophets." See Hobbes' Leviathan, p. 203. Chubb's works, Vol. ii, pp. 41, 43. Bolingbroke's works, Vol. v, p. 91. They undertook to get rid of the conclusion we would naturally think they would arrive at, by saying these wonders were done by Egyptian magic. To answer fully your first questions, as several of them involve this point, I will put two or three of them together. You say, "Were these several books now composing the Bible in whole or in part, culled from a collection of MSS., and if so, by whom, and by what authority? And have we any evidence that these compilers for the time at least, were by any means made infallible judges of the matters before them? and were these compilations the work of more than one session, and if so, when and where the others?"

Here are several questions, but the answer to the one point before us will answer all these questions. I know the view is taken by some, (as I heard a Spiritualist lecturer say last week), that there were three Councils in the fourth century, to settle the canon of the Scriptures, namely, the Council of Nice, the Council of Krut, and the Council of Laodicea. But I affirm that these Councils were not for the settlement of the canon of the Scriptures, but for altogether a different matter. If you are in any way acquainted with the Councils of the fourth century, you are aware that the great subject before them was the doctrine of the trinity. In the Council Nice, (325) which was the first Council in the fourth century, the Scriptures were referred to as authority on the subject under dispute; and no one is mentioned as raising a question as to the canonical authority of the books quoted. Is it likely that a Council composed of those who held views so at variance with each other, would at once adopt books as authority in the settlement of their disputed points, without the best of evidence that they were the genuine productions of the apostles? Should we not expect if it was a fact, that the matter had not yet been settled as to what books were written by the apostles, that the great dispute would be on that point in the first place, instead of their all readily yielding assent to the documents quoted? Prior to the time of the assembling of the Council of Nice, seven lists of the books of the New Testament were made out which agree exactly with ours. Six others were made out which agree with ours, with the exception that they were not satisfied with the book of Revelation, thinking it contained views which favored too much a sect called the Millenarians. But Eusebius says in his list, which agrees also with the present list, that "the book of Revelation was questioned by some, but was generally received, and is not to be doubted." Lardner Vol. ii, p. 368 . Before the close of the second century, early Christian writers had made comments on the New Testament, and referred to every book we now have in the New Testament as genuine productions of the apostles. These commentators have quoted so copiously from the New Testament that their writings contain every verse in the New Testament except 26. But I will admit that at the time of some of the later councils, the excitement had run so high on the subject of the trinity that some had, in order to maintain their favorite tenets, forged epistles, and these epistles were challenged and investigated. But if there had not been as yet a collection of books which were understood to be sacred, there would have been no way for them to determine the question of the authenticity of those books. They could only be guided aright in their decisions by comparing these productions with the New Testament. These forged books were found to teach sentiments which did not agree with the New Testament. They were also shown to be forgeries of the 4th century, and these are the very productions referred to by Mosheim and others, which were written and ascribed to certain of the apostles.

If we go to the second century we there find Origen. He was born within less than 100 years of the time of the Apostles. He made out a list of the books of the New Testament in the year 210 A. D. "This list contains no other books than those of our sacred volume, and includes all that are now received except the epistles of James and Jude, which could not have been omitted by design, as in other places in his works he expressly acknowledges them as a part of the sacred canon."—M'Ilvaine's Evidences, p. 69.