SIR ROBERT ANDERSON
Secret Service
Theologian
BIOGRAPHY
CHAPTER X
AUTHOR, TEACHER AND DEFENDER OF THE FAITH
When Sir Robert
Anderson was at leisure from official duties he undertook literary work in
defence of Christian truth and the authority of Holy Scripture. The qualities
which made him eminent in official life, together with his loyalty to truth and
his incisive logic, rendered his advocacy of those causes weighty and
influential.
(From a Minute of the Victoria Institute, 22nd December 1918.)
Sir Robert Andersons books are amongst the most valuable of our day,
and will long abide as a testimony to the truth of the Gospel.
The Rev. W.
H. Griffith Thomass, D.D., in The Evangelical Christian.
Sir Robert
Anderson is in some respects the most remarkable of current writers on
religious subjects, whether we consider his personal history or the range and
character of his work. . . . To sit at the feet of a man with such knowledge,
mental power, courage and native wit, who is at the same time Spirit.taught, is
for the true Christian one of the greatest privileges.
The Rev. James M.
Gray, D.D., of Chicago.
IN his Introduction to The Scarlet Letter Nathaniel
Hawthorne descants feelingly upon his incapacity for literary effort during the
years when he held an appointment in the Custom House. But there are spheres of
work in the public service compared with which the Custom House might seem
almost a sanctuary!" A quotation from the Preface of one of my fathers
books. Knowing a little of the conditions under which some at least of them
were written, one could underline the words.
Back in 1876 his old college
friend Canon Teignmouth Shore asked : "How on earth have you had time to dive
into theology?" And in later years Dr. A. T. Pierson wrote: "I often wonder
when and how you found time to develop the 'theologian,' for I find few amongst
the most acute writers on doctrine whose power to differentiate equals your
own."
Altogether seventeen volumes on varied aspects of the Christian faith
and life, besides three books of a secular nature and numerous pamphlets and
magazine and newspaper articles, came from his pen. In many cases the aim was
to help fellow- believers in the knowledge and understanding of their Bibles,
and to build them up in the Faith; and the over-mastering desire to exalt the
Lord Jesus Christ was ever present. Several books were concerned with the
defence of the Scriptures against the errors of rationalism or superstition. In
some instances the method was frankly destructive criticism of the methods and
conclusions of Biblical critics. The results of prolonged study of prophecy,
fulfilled and awaiting fulfilment, were seen in other works.
In one or two
books the appeal was mainly to men of the world as such. Regarding one such
effort, first published anonymously as A Doubter's Doubts about Science and
Religion, Mr. W. E. Gladstone (British Prime Minister) wrote "I agree with
you about dilapidation in some quarters and danger in more. I think that to
counter-work the process and try to build up his fellow-creatures in the faith
is the highest way a man has of serving them. I opine that you are not very far
from this sentiment, and I heartily hope your book will be successful."
The Gospel and its Ministry, appearing in 1875, has reached sixteen
editions. It deals in fresh and striking terms with the great truths of the
Gospel of the Glory of the Blessed God (see i Tim. i. xi) : Grace, the Cross,
Faith, Repentance and the Spirit's Work, Substitution, Righteousness,
Sanctification, Reconciliation, Justification and kindred topics. Dr. Falconer,
an ex-Moderator of the English Presbyterian Church, wrote to my mother:
"After checking them [Sir Robert's books] and comparing them with Ewald, A. B.
Davidson, Fairbank's Typology and other writings, I am more than ever convinced
that The Gospel and its Ministry is simply the classical handbook on the
doctrines of grace. It should be in every minister's library. Some points of
course I might put differently, but the substance of the Evangel is splendidly
stated in that great book and in a style hardly any theologian can rival."
Mr. Duncan Davidson of Inchmarlo said: "I'm giving away (and studying over and
over again myself) The Gospel and its Ministry. It is the only book that
touches on the Godhood of God. That false general Fatherhood is lulling the
multitudes to sleep." In 1892 permission was given for translation into
Swedish, and a Japanese version was published in 1904, the work of the Rev. A.
B. Hutchinson of the Church Missionary Society. Baron Alexander de Heeckeren
asked in 1905 for permission to prepare a Dutch translation, but I do not know
if this was published.
The Coming Prince was written during very
busy years, much of it late at night after "overtime" official work. The title
refers to "the prince that shall come" of the ninth chapter of Daniel, and the
book offers a solution of the much-discussed prophecy of the "seventy weeks."
This depended on fixing the date of the decree to "restore and build Jerusalem"
as the 14th March 445 B.C., and on the calculation that sixty-nine sevens of
prophetic years (173,880 days) from that date ended on the 6th April A.D. 32.
On that day, now known to us as Palm Sunday, for the first and only time in His
earthly life the Lord was publicly acclaimed as the long-looked-for King of
Israel.
For ascertaining the terminus a quo the Astronomer Royal, Sir
George Airy, kindly had calculations made showing that new moon occurred at
Jerusalem on the 13th March 445 B.C. (444 Astronomical) at 7h. 9m. A.M. The
words of the prophecy are "unto the Messiah the Prince,", and as stated above
the day of the triumphal entry into the Holy City on the eve of the Crucifixion
was reckoned to be the terminus ad quem.
In the Preface to the tenth
edition of his book Sir Robert claimed that the searching criticism to which
this elucidation of the prophecy had been subjected had failed to detect error
or flaw; and that its exact fulfilment provided overwhelmingly cogent evidence
for the Divine authority of Daniel. On this interpretation the seventh "week"
(i.e. seven years) remains to be fulfilled. But regarding the future our author
refused the temptation to attempt prediction in detail. He held unswervingly
however to the conclusion that the Anti-Christ is yet to come, and that this
great world-ruler for whose advent the stage is now being prepared is none
other than "the prince that shall come" of Daniel's prophecy, the last great
monarch of Christendom, "who by the sheer force of transcendent genius will
gain a place of undisputed pre-eminence."
Amongst the changes which must
precede his appearance are the restoration of the Jews to Palestine. Writing
sixty years ago, before the inception of Zionism as a practical movement, the
author said that the prophecies of a restored Israel seemed to many people as
incredible as predictions of the triumphs of steam and electricity would have
appeared a century previously. As to how this restoration might come to pass it
was suggested that the decline of Moslem power along with other causes
indicated might lead to the formation of a protected Jewish State, possibly
with a military occupation by or on behalf of some European Power or Powers.
Then "nothing more need be supposed than a religious revival among the Jews to
prepare the way for the fulfilment of the prophecies." Another interesting
fore-view is given in discussing the predicted division of the Roman earth
about which so many guesses have been ventured by prophetic students.
"History repeats itself," wrote Sir Robert in the days of Victorian peace and
security; "and if there be any element of periodicity in the political diseases
by which nations are afflicted, Europe will inevitably pass through another
crisis . . . and it is impossible to foretell how far kingdoms may become
consolidated and boundaries changed."
In view of the European situation
to-day (1946) another suggestion is of importance regarding the vision recorded
in the seventh chapter of Daniel in which the four winds of Heaven strove upon
the great sea and four great beasts came up from it. This has generally been
taken to refer to the same Gentile kingdoms as the vision of the great image in
chap.. ii., viz., Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome. But in an appendix note my
father hinted that the vision might have a still future reference, allowing
that (as elsewhere in Scripture) the great sea meant the Mediterranean. "May
not the opening portion refer to the gigantic struggle which must come some day
for supremacy in the Mediterranean?" The lion might typify Britain, and the
bear represent the Russia of to-day fully as well as the Persia of Cyrus and
Darius. But such suggestions were purely tentative, including the possible
identification of the third beast with Germany or France.
His views were
assailed with vigour by writers of the "Historical" school, notably by Dr.
Grattan Guinness. But Sir Robert claimed that his writings gave proof that he
thoroughly accepted a historical interpretation of prophecy; his objection was
to "the system which dares to write 'fulfilled' across the prophetic page. Dr.
Guinness asserts that the apocalyptic visions have been fulfilled in the events
of the Christian era. I hold him to that of the sixth chapter [of the Book of
Revelation]. That vision describes the tremendous events which lead men to call
upon the mountains to fall on them and hide them from the face of Him that
sitteth upon the Throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of
His wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?" The historical system
teaches that these awful words meant nothing more than the rout of heathen
hordes by Constantine! He claimed that the question was vital, for that
interpretation would mean that the most awful warnings of Scripture were wild
exaggeration. Further, he urged that if that vision still awaits fulfilment, so
do all the prophecies which follow it in the Revelation, My father often quoted
Lord Bacon's belief that many of the prophecies "have springing and germinant
accomplishment throughout many ages, though the height and fulness of them may
refer to some one age."
In a long Preface to the fifth edition of The
Coming Prince Professor S. R. Driver's arguments against the authenticity
of Daniel were subjected to analysis and criticism. A further indictment of his
views as expressed in his Book of Daniel was contained in a short work entitled
Daniel in the Critics' Den, the first edition of which however was in
the main a reply to a book of a popular nature by Dean Farrar. In the latter
all possible evidence against the authenticity of Daniel had been marshalled;
and yet according to the Dean no words could exaggerate the value of this work
of "avowed fiction" by some holy and gifted Jew of a later time. Historical
errors were alleged; also "violent errors as to matters with which a
contemporary must have been familiar." It is strange at the present date to
find amongst "historical errors" the fact of the existence of Belshazzar and
Darius the Mede! But space can be given' here to one point only in this attack.
According to the Scripture record Belshazzar made Daniel the third ruler in the
kingdom. This statement had always presented a difficulty until, the discovery
that Nabonidus was king at the time and Belshazzar himself only the second
ruler. Defenders of the reliability of the Bible naturally made much of this
fresh evidence. Farrar's comment was: "Unhappily for their very precarious
hypothesis, the translation 'third ruler' appears to be entirely untenable ; it
means one of a board of three." I remember that just when my father was writing
on the subject he paid one of his visits to Cambridge, and at Professor
Macalister's home he met Dr. Adler (The Very Rev. Hermann Adler, D.D., LLD.,
Ph.D., Chief Rabbi United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire). When the
question was put to the Chief Rabbi he replied after a moment's thought - "
the third ruler." He afterwards wrote
"I have carefully considered
the question you laid before me at our pleasant meeting on Sunday. . . . I
cannot absolutely find fault with Archdeacon Farrar, as he follows two of our
Hebrew commentators of great repute. Others translate this passage as 'he shall
be the third ruler in the kingdom.' This seems to be more strictly in accord
with the literal meaning of the words as shown by Winer . .
A letter from
Professor A. F. Kirkpatrick of Cambridge about the same time (1895) gives his
view thus : "The Aramaic presents peculiar difficulties, but 'and rule as third
in the kingdom' is probably the right translation." I refer to this at some
length first as illustrating the recklessness of the critic in the attempt to
prove his case; and also as an instance of the care my father took in preparing
a reasoned defence and reply.
"A REMARKABLE TITLE, and it heralds A
REMARKABLE BOOK.
We are profoundly grateful for this most striking
endeavour to move a terrible stumbling block out of the way of many." The words
are from a review in The Record of The Silence of God, a book written in
1897 during the Scotland Yard period. It was in a Preface to this work that my
father made the reference to Nathaniel Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter quoted
at the beginning of this Chapter.
"'A Silent Heaven is the greatest
mystery of our existence.' In these words the problem is stated. It is
illustrated by the hideous tale of the Armenian massacres of 1895 and 1896
which raised such a storm of indignation against Turkey that the Sultan Abdul
Hamid was shamed into laying aside his dignity and making his personal defence.
'But in vain do we strain our ears to hear some voice from the throne of the
Divine Majesty. The far-off heaven where in perfect peace and unutterable glory
God dwells and reigns is SILENT!'"
And how immeasurably greater is the
mystery now in face of the horrors of the war which has just drawn to its
close! But the problem includes a vast deal more - the sufferings of the
martyrs the death of missionaries at the hands of those for whose sake they had
gone forth; the oft-times prolonged painful illnesses of saints of God in spite
of the prayers of those who love them.
The problem seems the more insoluble
in view of the miracles of Divine intervention recorded in Scripture. But the
book proceeds to show that miracles which were so frequent when the Lord was on
earth, and in the early days of the Church as recorded in the Acts, gradually
ceased before the close of that book is reached. And although there have been
innumerable answers to the prayers of His people throughout the intervening
centuries, the world has never witnessed any public manifestation of God's
intervention.
It may be suggested that the notable instances of Divine
interventiôn at Dunkirk and on other occasions during this and the last
great war are evidence that the statement is not correct. They are indeed proof
that God is still on the throne. But He remains within the shadows, and there
is no public intervention such as would silence the scoffer.
The solution
of the mystery is found in the fact that miracles are connected with the
history of God's earthly people - Israel.
The Book of Acts records their
final rejection, as a people, of their Messiah. The Epistle to the Romans
reveals that a new dispensation had begun with the setting aside for a time of
the Jews, and the proclamation of the Gospel of grace and reconciliation to all
without distinction. "Grace reigns unto eternal life." The book goes on:
"A SILENT HEAVEN! Yes, but it is not the silence of callous indifference or
helpless weakness. The silence is the pledge and proof that the way is open for
the guiltiest of mankind to draw near to God. When that silence is broken one
day it will mean the withdrawal of the amnesty : the end of the reign of grace;
and the dawning of the day of wrath foretold in Scripture. God is silent now
because He has spoken His last word of mercy and love in Christ. He is
beseeching men to be reconciled [2 Cor. v. 20]. The One to whom all judgment
has been committed, and who will appear one day as the Judge of all, is now the
Saviour and is seated upon the Father's throne in grace."
A Danish version
of The Silence of God, entitled Gud's Tavshed, appeared in 1917,
the work of Mr. J. Fischmann of Copenhagen. I have had the pleasure of lending
a copy to some of our Danish friends in Capetown.
The famous preacher
Charles Haddon Spurgeon said that Human Destiny was "the most valuable
contribution on the subject" that he had ever seen. In this volume various
theories of Universalism, Conditional Immortality and the Wider Hope are
subjected to searching investigation. The immense problems and difficulties are
freely admitted ; but an appeal is made from the ideas of men to the Divine
revelation regarding the tremendous question - After Death, What?
"On this
subject," says the author, "'orthodoxy' has gone beyond what Scripture
warrants, and 'heresy' ignores or denies some of its plainest teaching." One
chapter deals with the question What is Life? An appendix discusses many
passages often quoted on the subject and gives a list of differing translations
of various Greek words. The pages of Human Destiny "are the reflex of
the struggle by which one enquirer has escaped from the difficulties set forth
in the opening chapter. Perchance the record may prove helpful to others."
Dr. Handley Moule, Bishop of Durham, contributed a Preface to The Bible and
Modern Criticism and The Lord from Heaven. Of the former he wrote
"What is the book? It is the free and (to use the word in its best sense)
popular presentation of the results of an independent study of the New
Criticism . . . done by a student entirely free from professional bias, and
trained in a severe school of legal and judicial investigation to sift
witnesses and to weigh evidence. In the best specimens of such study there is
often a quite peculiar value, a fresh and bracing air of thought all their own,
a faculty for throwing wholesome light upon subjects tangled by the
over-handling of experts. Experts, as Sir Robert Anderson reminds us, are by no
means as such good judges."
Any brief sketch of the argument of this book
would do it scant justice, and I will not attempt an outline. But I give an
example on "the lighter side "of the way in which special experience and
training may be brought to bear upon the problems with which critics deal. It
relates to the moral difficulties of the Old Testament. "A few years ago," Sir
Robert wrote," a certain London merchant killed an unfortunate wretch whom
circumstances had placed in his power. He did not actually kill him with his
own hands, but he had him brought to a secluded room prepared for the purpose.
And there he stood by while his victim was strangled by a man whom he had hired
to do the deed. I myself examined the place. I can testify moreover that all
the facts were known not only to the authorities but to the Queen. And yet not
only did the homicide go unpunished, but with the full knowledge of all I have
related Her Majesty singled him out for Royal favour and conferred a title upon
him."
I heard my father read this paragraph to a highly intelligent and
cultured friend, and I remember the horrified exclamation which escaped her,
and the amazed relief with which she heard the denouement. The story goes on:
"What estimate will my readers form of such conduct on the part of one [Queen
Victoria] whom we have been taught to regard as a pattern and paragon of public
and private virtue? But before they pass judgment they ought to know a few
additional details. The victim was a condemned murderer; the man paid to
strangle him was the common hangman. The secluded room was in Newgate Prison;
and the merchant who received a knighthood was the Sheriff whose official duty
it was to execute the criminal."
"And now," the author, continues, "the
meaning of my parable will begin to dawn upon the reader. Let these added
details be suppressed, and a narrative which does not contain a syllable that
is untrue or even exaggerated may seem to endanger the reputation of the Queen.
And it is precisely by this sort of suppression that the Bible and the God of
the Bible are misrepresented. Will any person of culture in our day dare to
defend the extermination of the Canaanites? Will anyone, I answer, dare to
defend the strangling of a helpless wretch in a shut-in room?" Men read the
Bible story, the book proceeds, in the false light of the evolution craze. They
picture a number of semi-civilised tribes on the upward path of progress being
exterminated by an invading horde of religious fanatics. Actually they were a
degenerate race whose destruction was decreed by a God of infinite mercy,
because they had given themselves up to unnatural and loathsome sin.
(Archaeology has shown that they were lapsing from civilisation, not emerging
from barbarism.) And God's mercy is seen in the fact that Israel were left as
strangers in a foreign land for four generations, "because the iniquity of the
Amorites was not yet full." Sir Robert adds in a footnote that, prior to
knowledge gained at Scotland Yard, the Divine judgments on the Canaanites were
a difficulty to him.
In the opinion of a reviewer in the New York Tribune
the Bible and Modern Criticism is "a work of singular lucidity of style
and remarkable argumentative power . . . which places critics as radical as
Professor Cheyne or as conservative as Professor Driver on their defence before
men of common sense." It was however no surprise that a mere layman should be
ignored by the critics. But it was a keen disappointment that the Bishop of
Durham's notable appeal in the Preface should have evoked no response from
them. Dr. Moule had been a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, Principal of
Ridley (Theological) Hall, and Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity in the
University, and, according to Bishop Weldon, "he was probably the most
accomplished classical scholar on the Episcopal Bench." Seldom had he written
with more impressive earnestness, said Sir Robert, than in his appeal to
Christians to take note of the tendencies of this Biblical criticism. But the
critics seemed blind to the consequences of their teaching and contemptuously
indifferent to the opinions of all who differed from them, whilst their
camp-followers in pulpits, lecture halls and schoolrooms and in the Press
carried on the work of proclaiming " the assured results of modern criticism."
The Bishop of Durham's plea was that this modern attitude to the
Scriptures was totally different to that of the Lord Jesus Christ alike before
and after His resurrection. To Him "it is written" was a formula of infinite
import. The principle involved lay at the heart of His teaching. But it was now
openly or tacitly taken to be out of date, narrow or uncultured to make much of
"it is written," as if an appeal to a supernatural book-revelation was a thing
discredited. This conclusion, if true, was portentous. It meant that on a
matter central in His message our Master was much mistaken. The most
worshipping theology might hold that He consented in His humanity to
limitations of His conscious knowledge ; but the Christ of the critics appeared
to be ignorant with the sort of ignorance which profoundly impairs the whole
value of a teacher - the ignorance of one who does not know where His knowledge
ends.
Such a fallible Christ lay open to the suspicion of fallibility on
other matters than the integrity of the Old Testament. If such conclusions were
demanded by irrefutable fact, let them be made, but not light-heartedly in the
modern style. Let them be made with a groan and let the unauthentic promise be
carved no more upon the tombs of the beloved dead. "But first," said Dr. Moule,
"let us take care to be sure that our detraction from the complete
infallibility of the Lord Jesus Christ has infallible grounds. Let us take
particular care to be sure that its basis is no a priori theory of the
genesis of religion which may already be on its way to discredit in the court
of knowledge and thought.
The question is of tremendous urgency. We are
contending for our all." The Bible and Modern Criticism was addressed in
the main to Christians. Another book, Pseudo-Criticism, made its appeal
rather to men of the world. The author again challenged the right of experts to
act as judge and jury in addition to giving their evidence, and pointed out how
lacking in judgment they often were. He showed that the apparent success of the
so-called Higher Criticism largely depended on the fallacy of supposing that if
a seemingly complete case could be made out against the genuineness of a book
the fact was thereby established that it was not genuine. Were the critics
aware that no criminal charge was ever sent for trial unless an apparently
complete case could be offered in support of it?
An example was the
"assured result" that the Pentateuch was a Jewish work of a comparatively late
date. A really strong case might be shattered by a single fact. And if the
critics' case against the Mosaic books were as complete as it was faulty there
was one fact which would explode it. That fact was the Samaritan Bible. The
C.I.D. story of the man who bought a false moustache was here requisitioned as
an illustration, The sacrosanct Scriptures of the Samaritans were limited to
the Pentateuch. The standing feud between them and the Jews was a matter of
common knowledge. Yet the critics would have us believe that the Scriptures
which the Samaritans held in such special reverence were literary forgeries
compiled by the Jews after the separation from them of the Ten Tribes, a
considerable portion dating from after the return of the Jews from the
Babylonian captivity! The critical case, however, rested, on Professor Driver's
own showing, only upon "plausible arguments, grounds of probability" and the
like.
A diary entry in December 1906 is of interest here : "To Mrs. Finn's
to view a wonderful old Samaritan Pentateuch. Her husband was British Consul in
Jerusalem, and befriended the Samaritan colony at Shechem." The Rev. A. H. Finn
was author of The Unity of the Pentateuch.
The Samaritan evidence is of
the utmost weight," said the Bishop of Durham in a personal letter. The reader
will perhaps ask, said Sir Robert, what answer the critics give. "The critics
give no answer whatever. Indeed they never notice anything urged against 'the
assured results' of their inquiries ; presumably because they imagine, as I
have said, that if a case can be established for or against anything the
question at issue is settled. It is an attitude of mind with which my
experience of legal and police work has made me familiar.
Dr. Robert
Sinker, Librarian of Trinity College, Cambridge, wrote to my father: "I think
the parallel you draw between the Incarnate Word and the Written Word is very
powerful; the One human save only without sin; the other human in its form,
Divinely infallible in its teaching."
The Lord from Heaven, the
other book for which the Bishop of Durham wrote a Preface, deals with the Deity
of Christ.
"To Christianity," said Dr. Moule, "if it is the Christianity
of original form and not of late and arbitrary theory, the Deity of the Lord
Jesus Christ, true, proper, absolute, is vital. It was an insight into that
vitality which made Athanasius strong contra mundum. .
He saw that no
compromise was possible. His opponents were prepared to say practically
anything of the greatness of the Christ short of this - that without reserve,
without compromise, sans phrase, He is GOD. . . . The human soul can find rest
only in a Saviour who is one with man and one with God. Such a Saviour bridges
as with living adamant the gulf of doom and sin which severs creature from
Maker. A Saviour not quite God is a bridge broken at the farther end."
The
author explains how he had been asked on one occasion to mediate between the
committee of a missionary society and some of their younger agents whose faith
had been disturbed by Moslem hostility to the truth of the Sonship of Christ.
He had been unable to find any book which definitely met their difficulties,
and the thought of writing such a one was suggested to him. It is not
controversial; it is a Bible study. And the question at issue was not merely
the divinity of our Lord, now generally acknowledged, but his Deity. "Thou
being a man makest Thyself God" ; this was the charge for which the Jews
threatened to stone Him.
After reading this book, Dr. Bullinger wrote: "I
feel I have a fuller, better and deeper knowledge of 'my Lord and my God,' and
praise Him and bless you for it."
Of Sir Robert's other works, The Bible
and the Church is referred to in Chapter XII of this memoir. The Hebrews
Epistle is a Bible Study demanding some deep thinking on the part of the
reader. The Way - Chapters on the Christian Ljfe throws fresh light on
many problems of the daily walk and warfare. The Entail of the Covenant
or the Saviour's Little Ones is of special interest to Christian parents,
dealing with the New Birth, Conversion, and many other vital matters in an
original way. Redemption Truths - For us Men treats of the doctrines of
the Gospel, being designed specially to help those who are seeking assurance
for themselves or who desire to lead others into the way of life.
Misunderstood Texts of the New Testament again sheds new light upon a
number of difficult or "misunderstood" passages.
Reference was made at the
beginning of this chapter to an early book, A Doubter's Doubts, which
attracted W. E. Gladstone's attention. A good deal of this was included in a
later work, In Defence - A plea for the Faith. This was written from the
standpoint of "the true scepticism which tests everything, not the sham sort
which credulously accepts anything that tends to discredit the Bible." One who
is a sceptic both by temperament and training, said the author, can appreciate
the difficulties of the honest truth seeker. A list of some of the writers
quoted in the course of the discussion gives an idea of its scope; Darwin,
Huxley, Tyndale, Kelvin, Herbert Spencer, Mark Twain, Sir Leslie Stephen,
Harnack, A. J. Balfour, Max Muller. Although some of the theories and positions
criticised are now discredited, the main argument is remarkably up to date.
The Honour of His Name (Psalm lxvi. 2), written in 1912, was "a
plea for reverence" in naming the Lord of Glory. "The Christian who accepts the
opening vision of the Apocalypse as a revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ as
now enthroned in Heaven will need neither warning nor appeal to avoid all
irreverent freedom in naming Him - to shun even the appearance of forgetting
'the honour of His Name.'" The author was referring to the manner in which the
Lord is so often spoken of by his human name, Jesus, alone, "as if He were a
dead hero or an equal." The book points out that while He is called Jesus
hundreds of times in the Gospel narratives, when we come to the words spoken by
the disciples to the Lord or to others about Him a title of reverence is always
used. The one exception is significant; the disciples on the Emmaus Road (Luke
xxiv. i 9) spoke of their late Master as "Jesus of Nazareth," proving by the
very words that they were thinking of the "prophet mighty in deed and word" who
was now dead. Not thus did they name Him when alive and present with them.
Sovereigns who have passed into history are commonly called by their Christian
names. But can one imagine a member of the great Queen's household speaking of
her as "Victoria" during her lifetime? Only an equal would have done so.
When we turn to the Epistles we find that "the modern familiar use of the
simple name Jesus has little authority in Apostolic usage." The words are
Bishop Ellicott's in his New Testament Commentary. " If we substitute 'no' for
'little,' " said Sir Robert, "this will accurately express the truth." In point
of fact the occurrences of the name "Jesus" by itself in the Epistles scarcely
exceed a score. The Apostle Peter does not use it once. James, the Lord's
brother, never names Him without some title. When used in the First Epistle of
John the significance is clear : "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son
of God" i.e., Jesus is the human name, the name of the man of Nazareth.
Similarly in the Acts : "God hath made that same Jesus whom ye have crucified
both Lord and Christ."
In all the thirteen Epistles acknowledged to be St.
Paul's, the "simple name" occurs only eight times. In the Epistle to the
Hebrews again it is used eight times; there, according to Ellicott's New
Testament Commentary, "it will be found that special stress is laid on the
lowly and suffering humanity of the Lord, or the historic facts of His ministry
on earth are referred to." In the Book of Revelation the Lord Himself uses the
name; "I Jesus" (Rev. xxii. i6; cf. Acts ix. 5, 6), and the remaining four
passages have special significance.
The first chapter of the Epistle to the
Corinthians shows the Apostolic usage. The words "Jesus Christ our Lord," "the
[or our] Lord Jesus Christ," occur six times in the first ten verses. "In many
a Christian book of two hundred pages that title of glory will not be found as
often as here in less than two hundred words "Hymnology is a delicate subject,"
said the author; "yet so great is the influence of hymns that Christians do
well to give intelligent thought to what they sing. The exigencies of rhyme and
rhythm have much to answer for; but some hymns would be improved even from that
standpoint by the substitution of "Lord Jesus" for "0 Jesus." Children's hymns
are often at fault. It is in early life that the habit of reverence can most
easily be formed. Yet in many a Christian home children are taught to speak of
the Lord of Glory much in the way some children, are allowed to talk about a
pet uncle." The words are startling, but they merit thought. Mrs. Duncan
Davidson wrote after my father's death: "Of all the things I learned from him,
I think his holy reverence for his beloved Lord stands out above everything.
'My Lord, my Lord Jesus,' as he often said."
The Hope of the Lord's Return
was an ever-present reality to my father throughout his life. Forgotten
Truths, written on this theme in 1913, was (to use his own words) the
outcome of earnest thought and study for more than half a century. In a letter
to myself at the time he said:
"Your reference to Forgotten Truths
in your letter to Mother has greatly interested me. You are entirely right on
two salient points first that the truth of 'the Coming' is not an isolated
doctrine that can be recognized or ignored without affecting the divine
revelation of Christianity. It is a vital and central element in it; and if
displaced (or misplaced) the unity of the whole is lost. And, second, it is too
true that it is generally not only ignored but rejected with a strange animus.
. . . I have just received a very cordial letter from the Bishop of Durham
about it. He says : - ' It arrived when I was away in Switzerland, and even now
I have by no means read it through. What I have read has done what your
writings always do for me. It has at once stimulated attention and challenged
thought, often along quite fresh lines, and has everywhere braced and
strengthened the faith of my soul in the divine character of Scripture.' He
adds that he hopes to make it his companion on 'an impending railway journey.
Was there ever a more gracious man!"
Easter-tide 1917 saw the appearance
of the last book, a small volume, Unfulfilled Prophecy and the Hope of the
Church, written in response to a request from the Prophecy Investigation
Society. A "special subject" in a school curriculum, said the author, is often
ignored as not being essential; and prophecy is neglected by many a Christian
as being unnecessary to salvation. But such neglect is perilous in these days
of subtle and sustained attacks upon the Bible. "The writings of the eminent
scholars who have led or championed that sceptical crusade (the destructive
criticism of the Bible) will be searched in vain for proof of acquaintance with
the scheme of Divine prophecy, a scheme which can be traced like a silver
thread through all the Scriptures. And still more remarkable is their neglect
of the typology of Scripture, so closely allied with prophecy. Indeed their
writings are notable examples of exegesis on the text-card system. These
critics are like men who empty the works of a watch into a bowl, and then
after, examining them in detail arrive at the sapient conclusion that they
present no proof of unity of design!" In a Preface to the second edition Sir
Robert remarked that the world war then raging appeared to be exciting fresh
interest in the study of prophecy. He uttered a word of warning however against
the chronological schemes and theories to which the deliverance of the Holy
Land from Turkish rule had given rise. For Jerusalem must remain under Gentile
control "until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled" (Luke xxi. 24). But
although Lord Allenby's victory in 1917 was not the fulfilment of any definite
Scripture it was clear that it prepared the way for the accomplishment of God's
purposes for Israel. "Prophecy is not given to enable us to prophesy, but as a
witness to God when the time [of fulfilment] comes." These words of Dr. Pusey's
were often quoted by my father, and chronological forecasts he said were to be
received with special caution.
Unfulfilled Prophecy is devoted mainly to
"sorting out" the various prophecies of the Return of Christ. It is shown that
there will be at least three "Comings." First that which will bring to an end
the present dispensation of the reign of grace and the heavenly Church. Then
the "Coming of the Son of Man" in fulfilment of Messianic prophecy; and lastly
His coming to judgment in the far distant future, the "Second Advent" of
theology.
"Christianity is based upon the teaching of the Bible; whilst the
theological doctrine of the Second Advent depends largely on the teaching of
the Latin Fathers. In their day the Coming which Bengel called 'the hope of the
Church' had already been forgotten, and Messianic prophecy had been so
perverted or 'spiritualised' as to shut out Israel's hope altogether."
It
is argued therefore in this volume that the great predictions and promises of
the Old Testament (including those in Daniel) which were not fulfilled at
Christ's first Coming have to do in the main with a time when God shall have
once again taken up His earthly people, Israel, as shown by St. Paul in the
eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. Much of the "apocalyptic"
teaching of our Lord, as well as that in the Book of Revelation, belongs to the
same future period. There it is revealed that this sin-cursed earth is yet to
be a scene of peace and blessedness - all that we should expect a God of
Infinite goodness and power to make it:
"When a King in Kingly glory,
Such as earth has
never known,
Shall assume the righteous sceptre,
Claim and wear the
holy crown."
But before that day dawns Israel must pass through a
"tribulation" even greater and fiercer than they have yet known. And there must
appear the Super-man, the Coming Prince of Daniel's vision, the Man of Sin of
the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, the Anti-Christ of St. John's first
Epistle, the Beast of the Book of Revelation, who will be endowed with satanic,
superhuman powers, so that all the world will worship him (Rev. xiii. 8, 12).
Our Lord Himself, in the twenty-fourth chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel,
uttered solemn warnings regarding those days. But He gave too the glad promise
of His own return in the clouds of Heaven with great power and glory as
foretold in Old Testament prophecy.
The Coming of the Lord revealed in the
Epistles of the New Testament however is one of the "mystery" truths of
Christianity; and, as Bloomfield puts it, "in Scripture the word mystery
signifies, not a thing unintelligible, but what lies hidden and secret till
made known by revelation of God." It is a Coming to call to their heavenly home
the redeemed of this present dispensation, which will thus reach its close.
This is the Coming ever brought to remembrance in the words : " As often as ye
eat this bread and drink this cup ye proclaim the Lord's death till He come" (1
Cor. xi. 26 [R.V.]). This is "the hope of the Church." And it is a fact of
great significance that it is never mentioned in the Epistles as a doctrine
needing to be expounded, but only as a truth with which every Christian was
supposed to be familiar.
Writing of Unfulfilled Prophecy, the
Bishop of Durham said:
"I hope that the 'Till He Come' which every
Communion service so solemnly and as with a voice from heaven reiterates will
mean yet more to me from your book. Those three great words are inscribed on
the cover of my communion table in our beautiful old Chapel. I have long
thought them the most appropriate of all mementos there."
Mention must be
made of the remaining books from the author's pen. Criminals and Crime
has been dealt with in ~ Chapter V of this memoir. Sidelights on the
Home Rule Movement was his only incursion into politics; the well-being of
Ireland was to him indeed a matter standing above politics in the ordinary
sense. He wrote, in the words of Lord Justice FitzGibbon, with "unexampled and
unprejudiced knowledge of the facts." The Lighter Side of my Official
Life contained, according to a review in The Librarian of February 1911,
"the personal recollections of a raconteur with an inimitable charm of manner
and no mean ability." My father hoped to write in more serious vein of his
official life at a later date; but this was not to be.
Specially bound
copies of several of the "theological" books were graciously accepted by Their
Majesties Queen Alexandra and Queen Mary, and some other members of the royal
family.
Chapter Eleven
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