The Testimony of Jesus.

1. The Positions of the Parties. We now come to testimony which, if explicit and unambiguous, should settle this controversy finally and forever. But at the threshold we encounter from both extremes of the new criticism objections to the introduction of it, Kuenen expresses the objection of the radical wing in words so striking and emphatic that they have been quoted often as the keynote of opposition from that quarter, He says:  

We must either cast aside as worthless our dearly bought scientific method, or must forever cease to acknowledge the authority of the New Testament in the domain of the exegesis of the Old (Prophets and Prophecy in Israel, 487).  

Shocking as this statement must ever be to a believer in Christ, it presents the necessary position of unbelievers; for if Jesus Christ possessed no supernatural intelligence, he was incapable of giving competent testimony in regard to the authorship of Old Testament books. As a witness he must be ruled out, and ruled out he is, directly or indirectly, by all the analytical critics. On the contrary, to all believers in him his testimony settles all questions on which he has deigned to speak.  

Kuenen, in the remark just quoted, betrays the unexpressed conviction that his "dearly bought scientific method" must be pronounced worthless, and must be cast aside as such, if the authority of the New Testament is acknowledged. In this he proves himself more candid and more logical than are many of his half-way pupils who profess faith in Christ . And let it not slip from our memory that the most radical of destructive critics recognize and frankly admit an irreconcilable antagonism between their theories respecting the Old Testament, and the statements on the subject in the New Testament.  

On the other hand, Prof. C. A. Briggs expresses the view of the "evangelical critics," in the following paragraph:  

Those who still Insist upon opposing higher criticism with traditional views, and with the supposed authority of Jesus Christ and his apostles, do not realize the perils of the situation. Are they ready to risk the divinity of Christ, the authority of the Bible, and the existence of the church, upon their interpretation of the words of Jesus and his apostles? Do they not see that they throw up a wall that will prevent any critic, who is an unbeliever, from ever becoming a believer in Christ and the Bible? They would force evangelical critics to choose between truth and scholarly research on the one side, and Christ and tradition on the other (Bib. Study, 196).  

This author is equally opposed with Kuenen to the introduction of the testimony of the New Testament on this subject, but on opposite grounds, He has such confidence in the "dearly bought scientific method," that the thought of its being proved worthless does not excite his fears, but he sees in it great peril to "the divinity of Christ, the authority of the Bible, and the existence of the church." He sees in it the likelihood that no critic who is an unbeliever will ever become a believer, a change highly improbable under any circumstances; and he sees in it the dire necessity that such men as himself shall be forced to choose between the new criticism and Christ—a. plain intimation that they would choose the new criticism.  

And yet, this author, in another place, takes the highest ground in favor of submitting to the authority of Jesus and his apostles. He says:

The authority of Jesus Christ, to all who know him to be their divine Saviour, outweighs all other authority whatever. A Christian must follow his teachings in all things as the guide into all truth. The authority of Jesus Christ in involved in that .of his apostles (ib., 186).  

Nothing could be better, or better said, than this. We should cast aside, then, all fear of consequences, and investigate with perfect candor the sayings of Jesus and the apostles on this subject . Whatever our conclusions derived from the study of the Old Testament may be, we must cast them aside as worthless, as Kuenen says, if we find them in conflict with the testimany of the New Testament; and whatever the result as respects critics who are now unbelievers, we must let Christ be true if it makes every man a liar.  

In order that our investigation of this most important question may be thorough, taking nothing for granted, we shall inquire first, Did Jesus know the facts involved in the Old Testament criticism? If he did not, then any affirmation by him on the subject proves nothing. Second, Did he affirm anything on this subject? If he both knew and affirmed, it follows that what he affirmed must be received with implicit faith by those who believe in him. Had our investigation of the Old Testament, which we have just now concluded, led us to accept the conclusions of the adverse critics, a contrary affirmation on the part of Jesus would bo sufficient ground for reversing the decision, supposing that we had been misled by ingenious sophistry; but as the matter stands, this new testimony is not really needed except for the purpose of finding more solid ground for our final convictions, than human judgment at its best can afford.  

2. Did Jesus Know? To the question, Did Jesus know who wrote the books of the Old Testament, the great lights of modern criticism, such as Wellhausen and Kuenen, together with all the lesser lights of the radical school, answer with an emphatic "Xo." Denying, as they do, his miraculous power, they also deny his miraculous knowledge, and claim that he knew, on such subjects, only what he learned from his teachers. They limit the knowledge of the apostles in the same way. As a necessary consequence, the testimony of Jesus on such subjects, no matter how explicit and positive it may be, has, with them, no weight whatever.  

When believing scholars began to favor the Old Testament criticism of these unbelievers, they soon perceived that the testimony of Jesus and the apostles would have to be reckoned with, and so they put their ingenuity to work in the search for some method of evading the apparent force of this testimony. The first effort in this direction that came under my own observation was an essay in the Expositor for July, 1891, from the pen of Dr. Alfred Plummer, under the heading, "The Advance of Christ in Sophia." Starting from the statement of Luke, that Jesus, when a child, "increased in stature and in wisdom" (sophia in the Greek), he argued that this increase in wisdom may have continued throughout the life of Jesus, and that, consequently, at every period of his life, even to the last, there may have been some things which he did not yet know, and among these the matters involved in Old Testament criticism. Add to the conclusion thus reached the fact that, according to his own statement, he did not know the day or the hour of his own second coming, and there remains but a short step to the conclusion that he may have been as yet ignorant of the authorship of the so-called book of Moses, and the reality of the facts recorded in it. A little later, Canon Gore introduced us to the doctrine of the Kenosis, as it is called, arguing the probability of our Lord's ignorance on critical subjects from the statement of Paul that though he was in the form of God, and thought it not a prize to be equal with God, he emptied himself, and took the form of a servant (Phil. ii. 6-8). This emptying included the laying aside of divine knowledge, so that he did not possess the latter while he was in the flesh. By this ingenious method of reasoning these gentlemen thought themselves justifiable in laying aside the testimony of him who had previously been regarded by all believers as the most important witness who could testify in the case. This they do "very reverently," and not with the irreverence with which infidel critics had already reached the same result. The accepted title of this process is "reverent criticism." Reverent it is in manner and tone, but not more so than the approach of Judas in the garden to kiss his Lord; and we are to see whether it is less deceptive  

I suppose that there is no intelligent person who now doubts that the knowledge of Jesus, during his infancy and his boyhood, was limited. But, after he received, at his baptism, the Holy Spirit without measure (John iii. 34), that Spirit which, in the words of Paul, knoweth all things, even the deep things of God (I. Cor. ii. 10), who shall dare to assign any limit to his knowledge additional to that which he has himself assigned? Who but himself can now, or could then, have knowledge of even this limitation? He often displayed miraculous knowledge, as when he detected the unexpressed thoughts of men, when he gave directions to Peter with reference to the fish which he would catch with a stater in its 'mouth, and when he directed him and John about preparing the paschal supper. He also showed a conscious knowledge of his own pre-existence when he said to the Jews, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad. Before Abraham was, I am" (John viii. 56, 58); and when he prayed to his Father, "I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work that thou gavest me to do And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory that I had with thee before the world was" (John xvii. 4, 5). If he had miraculous knowledge, as these facts demonstrate, who shall dare to set a limit to his exercise of it? Can a "reverent" critic do so?  

Our Lord's own statement that he knew not the day or the hour of his second coming is one of the most astonishing utterances that ever fell from his lips. Its singularity is not realized until it is considered in its connection with the other things belonging to his second coming, which he did know. He knew that it would occur after the destruction of Jerusalem, and after Jerusalem shall cease to be trodden under foot by the Gentiles; he knew by whom he will be accompanied—by all the angels of God; he knew what men will be doing when he comes—that they will be engaged in all the avocations of life, as when the flood came upon the world, and as when fire came down upon Sodom; he knew what he will do when he comes— that he will awake all the dead, sit on a throne of glory, assemble all the descendants of Adam before him, dividing them as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; he knew that he will call those on his right hand into his eternal kingdom, and expel those on his left into eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. He even knew that two men would be in the same bed, that two women would be grinding at the same handmill, and that in each instance one would be taken and the other left . If he knew all this respecting his second coming, how is it possible that he did not know the precise time of it? This question no man on earth can answer, and I presume that the same is true of the angels in heaven. It would be an absolutely incredible statement, had it not come from lips that can not speak falsely. And are we not here justifiable in saying that he who assigns any other limit to the knowledge of Jesus is guilty of a presumption that is near akin to blasphemy? I think so. And I think that the soul of every man who worships Jesus as Lord must shudder at the thought of charging him with ignorance respecting the Holy Scriptures, which were written by holy men guided by his own Holy Spirit.  

3 Did Jesus affirm? We now ask, Did Jesus make any explicit affirmations in respect to the authorship of Old Testament books, or to the reality of events recorded in them I Before producing any instances of the kind, I will first quote same of the utterances of scholars who deny that he did, and try to test the grounds of their denial; and, as Professor Briggs has elaborated the argument on the negative side more extensively than any other recent writer of my acquaintance, he shall be heard first.  

Before I come to closer issues, it may benefit some readers to see how this professor deals with a sweeping remark by which it has become common to wave aside the whole discussion on which we are entering. Quoting this remark from its originator, the professor says:  

Clericus went too far when he said that Jesus Christ and his apostles did not come into the world to teach criticism to the Jews. Then he adds: "The response of Herman Witsius, that Jesus came to teach the truth, and could not be imposed upon by common ignorance, or be induced to favor vulgar errors, is just" (Bib. Study, p. 184).  

This answer must be approved by every one who has faith in Jesus as a teacher sent from God.

Immediately after pronouncing this just judgment, our professor proceeds to say: "And yet we can not altogether deny the principle of accommodation in the life and teachings of Jesus." He supports this assertion by referring to what Jesus says of the permission of divorce under Moses, saying that "Moses, because of the hardness of their hearts, suffered ancient Israel to divorce their wives for reasons which the higher dispensation will not admit as valid." This proves that God, under the former dispensation, gave Israel a law which he would not have given had the state of their hearts been different; but how does this show that the principle of accommodation is found "in the life and teachings of Jesus"? The proof and the proposition to be proved are as far apart as Moses and Jesus. Moreover, it is not correct to say that the reasons for this law were such as "the higher dispensation will not admit as valid;" for, in presenting them to his hearers, Jesus did admit that they were valid at the time in which they were acted upon. Moses did right in granting the privilege of divorce at will, although it was not permitted in the beginning, and was not to be permitted under the new dispensation. In pursuance of this same line of thought, Professor Briggs quotes from Dr. S. H. Turner the following sentence:  

It is not required in a religious or inspired teacher, nor, indeed, would it be prudent or right, to shock the prejudices of his uninformed hearers, by inculcating truths which they are unprepared to receive (ib., p. 185).  

So far as this is intended to apply to the question in hand, truths about the authorship and credibility of Old Testament books, it is wide of the mark; for no one claims that Jesus should have corrected prevailing beliefs on critical questions. The only question is, Did he affirm the correctness of those beliefs? But, apart from this, the principle here laid down is untrue to the facts in the life of Jesus; for be was constantly shocking the prejudices of his hearers by inculcating truths which they were unprepared to receive; and it was on account of his persistence in inculcating such truths that they hated him and crucified him. The same is true of the apostles, and of all the projects of Israel. The same is true also of Professor Briggs himself; for it was because of his inculcating, what he regards as just such truths on higher criticism, in the presence of a people not prepared to receive them on account of their alleged ignorance, that he was tried as a heretic and dismissed from the ministry of the Presbyterian Church. This experience, which has come upon him since he wrote the book from which I quote, ought to convince him, if it has not, that the statement in question is erroneous.  

On the next page (186) Professor Briggs repeats, in a slightly different form, but in closer connection with the question at issue, the remark just disposed of. He says: "There were no sufficient reasons why he should correct the prevailing views as to Old Testament books, and by his authority determine these literary questions." Of course, there were not; especially if those "prevailing views" were correct, as we believe But no one claims that he should have corrected those views, even if they were incorrect . We claim only that, if they were incorrect, he could not have endorsed them; and the only question is, Did he, or did he not, endorse them?  

Another evasive remark follows on the same page:  

If they [Jesus and the apostles] used the language of the day In speaking of the Old Testament books, it does not follow that they adopted any of the views of authorship and editorship that went with these terms in the Talmud, or in Josephus, or in the apocalypse of Ezra; for we are not to interpret their words on this or any other subject by Josephus, or the Mishna, or the apocalypse of Ezra, or by any other external authorities, but by the plain grammatical and contextual sense of their words themselves.  

All this is strictly true, but it amounts to nothing in this discussion No one contends that the inspired utterances about Old Testament books involve an adoption of the views of any of the authors mentioned. Everybody agrees that these utterances are to be interpreted "by the plain grammatical and contextual sense of their words;" but in this interpretation reference must invariably be had to the sense in which his hearers understood the words employed. Jesus could not, in addressing certain hearers, employ the deceptive trick of using "the language of the day" in a sense quite different from what was customary, without an intimation that he was doing so. When, then, he used "the language of the day" in speaking of Old Testament books, he used it as his hearers understood it, and his exact meaning is to be gathered from "the plain grammatical and contextual sense of the words themselves." I suppose that Professor Briggs would accept this modification of his remark.  

After dealing with these general remarks of Professor Briggs intended to break in advance the force of any testimony of Jesus on critical questions, I now come to something more specific}—his application of critical principles to the Book of Psalms. Here he does a gratuitous work by laboring to refute the idea that David wrote all of the psalms in this book. I think it impossible for any one who has ever read the Psalms to conclude that David wrote all of them, unless he should come to the question with a. foregone conclusion, and employ the same kind of special pleading common with the destructive critics. A sample of this kind of sophistry, covering a whole page in fine type, is copied by the professor from an old Puritan commentary on Hebrews; and on reading it one is strikingly reminded of some later pages from the professor's own pen. Such is the New Testament evidence, however, in favor of the Davidic authorship of six of the Psalms, that on this evidence he admits them to be David's. This is an admission that the testimony of Jesus or an apostle on the question of authorship, when specific, is conclusive. Among the six is Psalm ex., and of this I wish to speak particularly, because it serves better than any other the purpose of determining whether the testimony of Jesus on the question of authorship is conclusive. Professor Briggs concedes that it is, at least in this instance, and yet he does not give the evidence its full force. His quotation of the words of Jesus is incomplete, and his argument based on them is weaker than the text justifies. But of this, more hereafter. (See Bib. Study, 187-190.)  

Notwithstanding this decisive judgment expressed in Biblical Study in the year 1883, it is by no means certain that Professor Briggs is still of the same opinion. The critics of his school are progressive; and the conclusions of to-day may not he those of to-morrow. Six years later, Professor Driver published his Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament, and he, though considered a conservative, takes the opposite ground, He says:  

This Psalm [the 110th], though it may be ancient, can hardly have been composed by David (Int., 384, note).  

In support of this conclusion he indulges in some very singular reasoning. He first says: "If read without prejudicium, it produces the irresistible impression of having been written, not by a king with reference to an invisible spiritual being standing above him as his superior, but by a prophet with reference to the theocratic king." Just so. This is precisely the way in which Jesus interprets it . He claims that it was written with reference to the theocratic king; that is, with reference to himself after he entered upon his mediatorial reign. It was not written by a king with reference to "an invisible spiritual being standing above him," but by a prophet, who was also a king, with reference to a glorified being in human form, yet destined to be far above every earthly king. The author goes on to give three reasons in support of this undisputed proposition; but as the proposition is admitted, it is not necessary to consider the reasons.  

Not satisfied with this effort, the author, in the same paragraph, makes another and distinct attempt to get rid of the Lord's testimony. He says:  

In the question addressed by our Lord to the Jews (Matt. xxii. 41-46; Mark xii. 35-37; Luke xx. 41-44) his object, it is evident, is not to instruct them on the authorship of the Psalm, but to argue from its contents; and though he assumes the Davidic authorship, accepted generally at the time, yet the cogency of his argument is unimpaired, so long as it is recognized that the Psalm is a Messianic one, and that the august language used in it of the Messiah is not compatible with the position of one who was a mere human son of David (ib., 384, 385, note).  

These remarks could be regarded as mere trifling were they not found in a volume written with the most serious purpose by a "reverent" author. They seem to have been written with only a vague remembrance of the words of Jesus to which they refer, and certainly without a close examination of them. Let us see what Jesus actually says:  

"Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, saying. What think ye of the Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The son of David. He saith to them, How then doth David in the spirit call him Lord, saying, The Lord saith to my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand till I put thine enemies under thy feet? It David then calleth him Lord, how is he his son?"  

It is as clear as day that the argument of Jesus depends for its validity on the fact that David is the author. True, as Professor Driver says, his object was not- to "instruct them on the authorship;" for that they perfectly understood; yet his argument is worthless if David was not the author. if the author was some other prophet than David, what would be- the sense of demanding, "If David calleth him Lord, how is he his son?" That he was the son of the man who called him Lord, is the essential fact in the argument; and any attempt to eliminate or to obscure this fact, is a bad case of wresting the Scriptures.  

Professor Cheyne, the most radical of English critics, unites with the German radicals in denying the Davidic authorship of this Psalm, but, unlike Professor Driver and other conservatives, he saves himself the hopeless task of trying to reconcile this denial with the words of Jesus. (See his Commentary on the Psalms, xvi. 301.) In thus ruling Jesus out of court as a witness in the case, he plays a daring game, but he saves himself the necessity of wresting away from the words of Jesus the only meaning which they can convey. It is not easy to decide which is the preferable alternative The man who takes either alternative antagonizes Jesus gratuitously, and he does so at his peril.  

I now come to the testimonies of Jesus respecting the authorship of the Pentateuch. But, before considering particular instances of this testimony, it may be well to quote what Professor Driver says on the general question of such testimony:  

There is no record of the question, whether a particular portion of the Old Testament was written by Moses, or David, or Isaiah, having ever 'been submitted to him; and had it been so submitted, we have no means of knowing what his answer would have been (Int., xii., xiii.).  

This first statement is true; and it is equally true that no advocate of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch has ever claimed that such a question was submitted to Jesus. But Professor Driver knows, as well as he knows his own name, that a man may say who wrote a certain book, or part of a hook, without having been questioned on the subject. I wonder if, in lecturing before his classes in the university, he never names the authors of books which he quotes till some student calls for the names. What kind of teacher would Jesus have been had he never given his hearers a piece of information till they called for it? And what would have been thought of him if, in quoting books to his hearers, he had never given the names of the authors quoted till they were called for? How could this ingenious writer have penned the sentence just quoted without being conscious that he was evading the question which he was professing to discuss? If this is throwing doubt on his perfect candor, respect for his good sense forces me to it.  

True, we have no record of the question being submitted, Did Moses or David or Isaiah write this or that? but what does this amount to if we find Jesus, at his own initiative, affirming that Moses or David or Isaiah wrote this or that? Is his voluntary affirmation to be called in question or explained away because no one had called for it? I think not. Turn, then, to what I shall style one of his indirect affirmations, and let us come to closer quarters in the agreement. In his disputation with the Sadducees, Jesus demanded: "Have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake to him, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?" (Mark xii. 26).  

Now, it is admitted by all scholars that there was in the hands of the Jews at that period a book, always written as a single book, and known by them as "The Book of Moses." It is admitted that that book is the one known to us as the Pentateuch, now divided into five books. It is admitted that the Jews universally believed that this book was written by Moses, and that for this reason they called it "The Book of Moses." When, then, addressing men who thus believed, Jesus calls it "The Book of Moses," did he confirm their belief that Moses was its author, or did he not? To test this, we need only to suppose that, after the conversation, some one had said to the Sadducee who had been the spokesman of his party, "That man Jesus does not believe that Moses wrote the book from which you and he quoted;" what would the Sadducee have answered? Would he not have said, "You are mistaken; he called it 'The Book of Moses,' just as we do; and if he did not mean what he said, ho talks deceitfully."  

Here we are met by an argument which Professor Briggs has stated with as much force as can be given it, and it is endorsed by all the "critics," whether "radicals" or "evangelicals." Quoting and endorsing the words of Professor Brown, his colleague, he says:  

The use of a current pseudonym to designate the author no more committed Jesus to the declaration that that was the author's real name, than our use of the expression, "Juniuc says," would commit us to a declaration that the "Letters of Junius" were composed by a person of that name (Bib. Study, 189, 190, note).  

This argument has more plausibility than the one quoted above from Professor Driver; but it is equally fallacious. To a class of students correctly informed as to the letters of Junius, Professor Briggs or Professor Brown could use the expression, "Junius says," without misleading them; but suppose either of them was addressing a class of students who were so ill-informed that they supposed a man whose real name was Junius to have been the author of these letters; and suppose that the professor, in addressing them, knew that they so thought; would he then feel at liberty to quote the letters again and again, saying, "Thus saith Junius"? Neither of them would think of doing it. They would be ashamed to do it. They would feel bound in honor to either inform the students, or quote the words as those of a distinguished writer without naming him. They would feel conscientiously bound to avoid committing themselves before that class to its own ignorant conception. Yet they openly charge on Jesus our Lord a practice in which they would themselves disdain to indulge.  

We may try this argument by another example. Neither of the three professors, Driver, Briggs nor Brown, believes that Paul wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews; does any one of them ever quote that document as an epistle of Paul? Does any one of them ever say, ''Thus saith the apostle Paul," and follow this with a quotation from Hebrews? They would consider it unmanly and deceptive to do so Why, then, will they charge Jesus with quoting a book which he knew Moses did not write, and styling it "The Book of Moses"? How easily he could have avoided committing himself thus, by saying to the Sadducees, "Have ye not read in the book of your law?"  

Such scholars as these would not thus wrest the words of Jesus, and do him this dishonor, were they not impelled by a false theory.  

The testimony of Jesus respecting the authorship of Old Testament books has been passed over in a very cursory manner by most of the destructive critics. They have had little to say about it, because they have found little that they could say with profit to their own cause. Any position taken by respectable scholars which affects in the slightest degree the absolute authority belonging to all utterances of Jesus our Lord, or the absolute sanctity of his character, demands our profoundest consideration before we can consider it with favor. If he made any affirmation which was not true, his authority as a teacher is invalidated; and if he affirmed anything which he did not know to be true, he fell short of absolute truthfulness. Perfect veracity demands that a man shall not only avoid affirmations which he knows to be false, but all that he does not know to be true  

We ask, then, most solemnly, and with a view to the most candid answer, Did Jesus, on any occasion, affirm unequivocally the Mosaic authorship of the writings commonly ascribed to Moses? Let us try his words addressed to the Jews at the feast of tabernacles, and recorded in John vii. 10: "Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you doeth this law?"  

That the Jews had at that time a book which they knew as the law of Moses, and which we know as the Pentateuch, is unquestioned and unquestionable. It is equally unquestionable that by "the law" Jesus here meant that book; for, on any other hypothesis, we should have to suppose that he dealt uncandidly with his hearers. He could not have meant by "the law" some nucleus of the law which came from Moses, while the main body of it was an accumulation growing out of the experience of ages, as some critics have conjectured; for candor required him to use the expression as his hearers understood it. Neither could he have referred to any particular statute of the law which may have come from Moses, while the rest had some other origin; for his demand had reference to the law as a whole, of which he denied that any of them had kept it . They had all observed some parts of it, but none had kept it as a whole. There is no uncertainty, then, as to what he meant by "the law." What did he mean by the demand, "Did not Moses give you the law V? In this question he employs the rhetorical figure of erotesis, which is the most emphatic form of making an assertion. It assumes that neither with the speaker nor with his hearers is any other answer possible but the one implied. Another example is the demand, "Did I not choose you, the twelve?" (John vi. 70). Another, the well-known words of Paul, "Was Paul crucified for you? or were you baptized into the name of Paul?" (I. Cor. i. 13). His demand, then, is the most emphatic assertion possible that neither with himself nor with his hearers could there be any doubt that Moses gave them the law. Affirmation of the Mosaic authorship of the law more emphatic or more explicit there could not be. But Jesus could not thus affirm that which he did not know to be true; and it follows as an irresistible conclusion that Jesus knew Moses to be the author of the law which the Jews connected with his name.  

There is not room here for any of the evasive remarks employed by destructive critics to obscure the Lord's testimony. The illustration of the letters of Junius can not be applied; for, to make it applicable, both the speaker and the hearer should believe that the author of the letters was a man named Junius, and both would be deceived. Professor Briggs' remark that when Jesus ascribes a certain law to Moses, he does not assume that Moses wrote the book in which that law is now found, can not apply; for it is of the law as a whole, and not of any particular statute, that the demand is made. Neither can Professor Driver's assertion, that no question raised by modern criticism was presented to Jesus for an answer, apply in this case; for, while it is true that no such question was propounded, Jesus did, without a question, make the demand of his own accord, and use the unquestioned fact of the Mosaic authorship to condemn his enemies. If any other than Moses had given the law, his argument would ha^e been fallacious.  

Finally, we must not fail to observe that, if Jesus had not desired to commit himself on the authorship of the law, it would have been the easiest thing in the world for him to have avoided it without weakening the rebuke which ho administered. He could have said, as even radical critics are now willing to say, "Did not God give you the law?" meaning that God gave it, not by inspiration, but in a providential way. Or he could have said, "Do you not believe that Moses gave you the law? and yet none of you doeth it."  

The fact that he chose neither of these, nor any other form of speech which would have been non-committal on the question of authorship, and that instead thereof he chose to commit himself in the most emphatic manner that human speech without an oath would permit, proves that it was his deliberate' intention to do so, and to thus leave on record his positive testimony on this important question. If he had known—and who may say that he did not ?—that this question would arise in the coming ages, he could not have anticipated it with a more decisive answer. How vain the remark, then, which we have quoted from Professor Driver, that if critical questions had teen propounded to Jesus, we have no means of knowing how he would have answered them!  

The most specific affirmation by Jesus of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch is found in the fifth chapter of John, and it reads thus: "Think not that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, on whom ye have set your hope. For if ye believed Moses, ye would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if ye believe no! his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" In this passage three facts receive emphasis, and they are emphasized as the grounds on which the unbelievers addressed arc condemned. The first is that Moses, the Moses on whom they "set their hope," is their accuser. Second, the ground on which Moses accuses them is, that they did not believe what ho wrote of Jesus: "If ye believe Moses, ye would believe me; for he wrote of me," A more explicit statement that Moses wrote of Jesus could not be framed in human speech. Third, the ground on which Moses accuses them is stated in another form, by the assertion that they believed not certain writings which are called his: "If ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?"  

Now, it is a historical fact, unquestioned and unquestionable, as we have said before, that the Jews addressed by Jesus had certain writings which they knew as the writings of Moses. Jesus here distinctly recognizes them as such. Not only so, but by placing these writings of Moses in antithesis with his own words, he leaves as little room to doubt that these writings came from Moses as that his own words came from himself. Furthermore, he affirms, and makes it the basis of his argument, that in those writings Moses wrote of Jesus—in what passage or in what words, it is not needful that we now inquire—and ho declares that Moses is the accuser of the unbelievers because they believed not what Moses thus wrote. If it was not Moses himself who thus wrote, and if the writings referred to as his were not his, then the argument of Jesus falls to the ground, and this whole passage from his lips is meaningless. And if here we have not an unequivocal and unmistakable affirmation of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, I defy any man to frame such an affirmation.  

Perhaps some of my readers are ready to ask, What answer do the destructive critics give to this presentation? The question is pertinent . If they have no answer to give, they should hold their peace forever on the main issue. The radicals see the difficulty very clearly, and they answer, with all candor, that Jesus was mistaken. They make no effort to explain away his words. The Evangelicals, as Professor Briggs calls them, have seen the difficulty; it would be disparaging to them to hint that they have not; but, so far as my reading has extended, they have not grappled with it . This we shall now show as to Professors Driver and Priggs, by quoting all that they say on the subject.  

4. The New Critics on This Testimony. Professor Driver formally introduces the issue on page xii. of the preface to his Introduction, and he states it thus:  

It is objected, however, that some of the conclusions of critics respecting the Old Testament are incompatible with the authority of our blessed Lord, and that in loyalty to him we are precluded from accepting them.  

After this very fair statement of the issue, he proceeds with a series of statements intended to show that the objection is not well taken. The first is a cautious approach to the discussion, and is stated in these words:  

That our Lord appealed to the Old Testament as the record of a revelation in the past, and as pointing forward to himself, is undoubted; but these aspects of the Old Testament are perfectly consistent with a critical view of its structure and growth.  

This remark is non-committal. Of course, these aspects of the Old Testament are consistent with a critical view of its structure and growth; for instance, with the critical view taken in Horne's Introduction, or in Bissell's Origin and Structure of the Pentateuch—the critical view which Driver and others now denounce as traditional. Put the question is, Are they consistent with the critical view taken by Professor Driver? They are certainly not consistent with that taken by Kuenen and Wellhausen; for they both deny "a revelation" in the proper sense of the word, and they deny the "pointing forward" to Jesus of which Driver speaks. On the real issue, whether they are consistent with the critical views of Driver and those who stand with him, he thus far gives only his affirmation.  

His next remark is this:  

That our Lord, in so appealing to it, designed to pronounce a verdict on the authority and age of its different parts, and to foreclose all future inquiry into these subjects, is an assumption for which no sufficient ground can be alleged.  

This remark is totally irrelevant . The expression, "in so appealing to it," means, in the connection, appealing to it a "the record of a revelation in the past, and pointing forward to himself." As a matter of course, in so alluding to it he pronounced no verdict on the authorship and are of its different parts; neither has anybody over said that he did. Why answer objections that have never been made? Why not answer the objections which have been made, instead of thus setting up and assailing men of straw? This is the common resort of sophists when they are conscious of inability to answer the real objections of their opponents.  

But our critic continues in the same strain by adding:  

Had such been his aim, it would have been out of harmony with the entire method and tenor of his teaching.  

Had what been his aim? The reference is to pronouncing a verdict on the authority and age of the different parts of the Old Testament. But nobody pretends that such was his aim. We are inquiring whether he affirmed that Moses wrote the Pentateuch. We have never affirmed, and have never believed, that Jesus said anything about its age and its structure beyond what is involved in its authorship. Again we ask, why does so acute an author as Professor Driver continually evade the issue which he himself so clearly stated at the outset?  

His next remark is this:  

In no single instance, so far as we are aware, did he anticipate the results of scientific inquiry or historical research.  

Perhaps he did not, when scientific inquiry' and historical research are properly conducted; but what has this remark to do with the question at issue? Why did not Professor Driver say, In no single instance, so far as we are aware, did Jesus say who gave the law to Israel? This would have been in point; but this he could not say.  

Again our author says:  

The aim of His teaching was a religious one; it was to set before" men the pattern of a perfect life, to move them to imitate it, to bring them to himself.  

Very good; but did he not, in doing this, rebuke men for not keeping the law which he said Moses gave them, and for not believing the writings of Moses in whom they put their trust? Why continue thus to evade the issue by irrelevant remarks?  

In the next sentence we find an indirect admission of the truth, with an attempt to break its force:  

He accepted, as the basis of his teaching, the opinions of the Old Testament current around him. He assumed, in his allusions to it, the premises which his opponents recognized, and which could not have been questioned (even had it been necessary to question them) without raising issues for which the time was not yet ripe, and which, had they been raised, would have interfered seriously with the paramount purpose of his life.  

Strip this sentence of its ambiguity, and what does it mean? It means that Jesus accepted as the basis of his teaching the opinion, among others, that Moses was the author of the law. Did he accept as the basis of his teaching an opinion which he knew to be false? He certainly did if Moses was not the author of the law. It means that "he assumed," in his allusions to the law, "the premises which his opponents recognized." Did he assume premises which he knew to be false? So Professor Driver must think; for he thinks that the assumption of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch is a false assumption, yet he holds Jesus guilty of that assumption.  

The additional assertion in the last quotation, that these opinions which he accepted could not have been questioned without raising issues for which the time was not ripe, is of no force whatever; for, as I have said before, Jesus did raise issues for which the time was not ripe, for some of which he was persecuted, and for one of which he was crucified. He knew nothing of that time-serving policy which accepts false opinions and makes false assumptions to avoid conflicts which the fearless utterance of the truth would involve. Moreover, our contention is not that he should have corrected the opinion, supposing it to he false, that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, but that he would not and could not affirm the truth of that opinion, knowing it to be false. That he did affirm it, I have abundantly proved.  

In order to fully represent Professor Driver's discussion of this issue, I must make one more quotation which I have already made use of in a former connection. He says:  

There Is no record of the question, whether a particular portion of the Old Testament was written by Moses or David or Isaiah, having ever been submitted to him, and, had it been submitted, we have no means of knowing what his answer would have been.  

As we have said before, the first of these two assertions is true; but it makes all the more significant the fact that, without a question being submitted, he volunteered to affirm that David wrote the 110th Psalm, and that Moses gave the law. As to his last assertion, nothing that Professor Driver says in this whole discussion is wilder. When Jesus said, "Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you has kept it?" does not this indicate what his answer would have been if one of his hearers had asked him, "Did Moses give us the law ?"? And when he said to another company of Jews, "If you do not believe his [Moses'] writings, how can ye believe my words ?" does this give no indication of what answer he would have given had one asked him, "Do you then believe that these writings came from Moses ?"?  

In conclusion, I ask the reader, how can you account for this evasive and irrelevant method, on the part of so learned and logical an author as Professor Driver, in discussing so simple a question? When he has an open path before him his reasoning is clear and cogent. He walks with a steady step, like a strong man on solid ground. Why, then, this faltering and wandering when he comes to discusssing the affirmations of Jesus respecting the Old Testament? Why does the strong man hero betray such weakness? Why but because he here felt conscious of the weakness of his cause?  

In Biblical Study, the most elaborate work written by Prof. Charles A. Briggs, a whole chapter is devoted to "The New Testament View of Old Testament Literature," and we shall now see more fully how he deals with the utterances of Jesus on the subject.  

On page 192 he says: "Jesus speaks of the law of Moses (John vii. 23) and the book of Moses (Mark xii. 26)." He cites several other passages from Luke and Paul, and then adds:  

These are all cases of naming books cited. They have as their parallel David as the name of the Psalter In Heb. iv. 7 and Acts iv. 25; Samuel, also of the Book of Samuel, Acts iii. 24. It is certainly reasonable to interpret Moses In these passages in the same, way as the name of the work containing his legislation and the history in which he is the central figure.  

We can judge of the correctness of these remarks only by seeing what is said in the passages cited. The first reads thus: "If a man receiveth circumcision on the sabbath, that the law of Moses be not broken, are ye wroth with me because I made a man every whit whole on the sabbath?" Is this a mere case of "naming" a book? There is nothing said of the book except by implication; but there is something said of a law, and it is called "the law of Moses." If Jesus did not mean to commit himself to the fact that this law was given by Moses, how easily he could have avoided doing so by saying that the law might not be broken. In the next preceding verse Jesus makes a statement preparatory to this, in which he recognizes as real the exact relation of this law to circumcision which is set forth in the Pentateuch. He says: "For this cause hath Moses given you circumcision (not that it is of Moses, but of the fathers); and on the sabbath ye circumcise a man." Here the fact that circumcision was first ordained in the time of the fathers, and not originated in the legislation of Moses, is set forth precisely as in our Pentateuch, and Moses is again credited with the legislation. It would be interesting to hear from Professor Briggs the reason why ho deals thus with this passage. Had he quoted it, instead of merely citing it, he would scarcely have impugned the intelligence of his readers by using it as he does.  

The second passage reads thus: "As touching the dead, that they are raised, have ye not read in the book of Moses, in the place concerning the bush, how God spake to him, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?" This is the naming of a book, or, more properly speaking, it is calling a book by its name; but it is more: it is the recognition of that name as a proper one; for if Jesus had not known that Moses was the author of the book, we can not believe that he would have confirmed the mistaken belief of his hearers by so styling it . How easily he could have avoided this, and still made his reference explicit, by saying, "The book of the law." These two passages confirm the testimony which they are employed to invalidate, by showing that Jesus indorsed the belief that Moses was the author of the book ascribed to him by the Jews.  

But Professor Briggs tries still further to escape from this conclusion by citing alleged parallels in the use of the names of David and Samuel. As to David, the language of the text is this: "Saying in David, after so long a time, To-day, as it hath been before said, To-day if ye shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts." What right has Professor Briggs to say that the name "David" is here used "as the name of the Psalter"? The writer quotes from David, but not from the book of David, as Jesus quotes from "the book of Moses." The Jews knew no book of David. Their book of Psalms, like our own, contained some compositions ascribed to David, some to other writers, and many to no particular author. Xo Jew who had ever read the book through could have supposed that David wrote them all. When they quoted David, then, they quoted same Psalm which they supposed to have been written by David; and this passage in Hebrews assumes only that David wrote the Psalm from which the quotation is made.  

The professor's remark about Samuel, just quoted above, has reference to an argument advanced by him on a previous page, and one which I believe to be original with him. He makes much use of it, and it is worthy, on this account, of particular notice. On page 190 the author quotes the words of Peter, "All the prophets, from Samuel and them that followed after, as many as have spoken, they also told of these days;" and he adds:  

The reference here is to the Book of Samuel, for the reason that there is no Messianic prophecy ascribed to Samuel in the Old Testament. The context forces us to think of such an one. We find it in the prophecy of Nathan in the Book of Samuel. These historical books then bore the name of Samuel, and their contents are referred to as Samuel's.  

This is an ingenious piece of argumentation; but it is marked by two fatal defects. First, it assumes as a fact that "these historical books then bore the name of Samuel," whereas they bore no name in the Hebrew text; they were styled the first and second books of Kingdoms in the Septuagint; and they were never called the first and second books of Samuel till A. D. 1488, when they were so styled in Romberg's printed Hebrew Bible. Such a blunder is a severe satire on an expert in historical criticism, and to base a boasted original argument on it is not a brilliant illustration of the "scientific method." This fact demolishes the foundation of the argument. Furthermore, if it is true that no Messianic prophecy is ascribed to Samuel in the Old Testament, the fact that one is ascribed to him in the New Testament ought to satisfy a man who believes in Christ and in the inspiration of his apostles. When Peter said that Samuel prophesied of the days of Christ, we ought to presume that Peter knew what he was talking about.  

The second argument by Professor Briggs is expressed in the following paragraph:  

Jesus represents Moses as a lawgiver, giving the Ten Commandments (Mark vii. 10). the law of the leper's offering (Mark i. 44, etc.), the law of divorce (Matt. xix. 7), the law in general (John vii. 19). The Epistle to the Hebrews represents Moses as giving the law of priesthood (Heb. vii. 14), and as a lawgiver whose law, when issued at the time, could not be disobeyed with impunity (Heb. x. 28). These passages all represent Moses to be the lawgiver that he appears to be in the narratives of the Pentateuch, but do not by any means imply the authorship of the narratives that contain these laws, any more than the reference in I. Cor. ix. 14 to the command of Jesus in Luke x. 7, and the institution of the Lord's Supper by Jesus (I. Cor. xi. 23), imply that he was the author of the Gospels containing his words (Bib. Study, p. 193).  

Here, again, in the citations from Jesus, he hides among a number of sayings of the Master, which, taken apart from others, are not specific affirmations of the authorship in question, one that is; viz.: the interrogation in John vii. 19, "Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you doeth the law?" Why did not the professor single out this passage, as his opponents have done, and show that it does not affirm the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch? If he could show that in the minds and speech of the Jews addressed by Jesus there was a distinction between the "law" and what we call the Pentateuch, he would have met the argument in part. But even then he would have had to show that Christ meant not the law as a whole, but only that nucleus of the law which critics ascribe to Moses, as distinguished from the civil law in Deuteronomy, and the Levitical law, both of which, as he himself affirms, were given by unknown persons many centuries after the death of Moses. Even what ho does make out of the passage, that Moses gave "the law in general," contradicts his own conclusions and those of all the critics with whom he stands.  

There is another anomaly in these citations from Jesus. Because Jesus says, in Mark vii. 10, "Moses said, Honor thy father and mother," the professor says that Jesus, in these words, represents Moses as giving the Ten Commandments. Why this conclusion? Why not reason as he does about other remarks of the same kind, and say, This does not represent Moses as giving the whole of the Ten Commandments, "not by any means;" it shows only that he gave the one about honoring father and mother. Well, it suits the theory to admit that Moses gave the Decalogue, and so the mode of reasoning which is scientific and conclusive in analogous cases is tossed aside in this.  

If Heb. vii. 14, as is asserted above, represents Moses as giving the law of priesthood, this contradicts the accepted crucial theory of the priesthood; for it is claimed that there was no law of the priesthood till long after Moses; that Ezekiel foreshadowed it, and that it was first made a law in the time of Ezra, or a short time previous. The passage reads thus: "For it is evident that our Lord hath sprung out of Judah; as to which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priests." The writer's argument assumes that if Moses spake nothing as respects priesthood in a certain tribe, then a man of that tribe could not be a priest. What more positive implication could we have that the law of the priesthood was all given by Moses, and not by an unknown priestly writer (P) a thousand years after the death of Moses?  

The passage cited from Heb. x. 28 reads: "A man that hath set at nought Moses' law dieth without compassion on the word of two or three witnesses." This shows that all the statutes with the death penalty attached came from Moses. But these are scattered all through the Pentateuch, intermingled with the others too closely to be separated. Immediately after these citations the professor inadvertently gives his whole cause away, by saying: "These passages all represent Moses to be the lawgiver that he appears to be in the narratives of the Pentateuch." But in the narratives of the Pentateuch Moses is represented as receiving from God and giving to the people every single statute of the law, both civil and religious. These passages, then, either misrepresent Moses, or the critical theory of the origin of the law is false, according to Professor Briggs' own representation.  

But the professor, not perceiving how completely he had given away his cause, makes the argument that while those passages prove Moses to be the lawgiver that he appears to be in the Pentateuch, they do not imply his authorship of the narratives that contain these laws, any more than Paul's allusions to teachings of Christ found in Luke's Gospel prove that Jesus wrote this Gospel. The conclusion does not follow, because the cases are not parallel. The author of this Gospel starts out with an explicit statement of his reason for writing in which he distinguishes between himself and Jesus. Secondly, no man among those to whom Paul wrote was laboring under the impression that Jesus wrote that Gospel, but all the readers to whom he and the other apostles wrote believed that Moses, wrote the law, and they necessarily understood allusions to its authorship accordingly. Finally, when Paul wrote First Corinthians, Luke's Gospel was not yet in existence, and it is absurd to speak of Paul's making allusions to it. It was written several years later, and some of the professor's fellow critics place it at least twenty years later, He knows this perfectly well; but in his eagerness to make a point he ignored it and committed this absurdity. This is more inexcusable than the mistake about Samuel.  

I now take up his third argument on these testimonies. He says:  

Jesus represents Moses as a prophet who wrote of him (John v. 6); so Philip (John i. 45); Peter (Acts iii. 22-24); Stephen (Acts vii. 37); Paul (Acts xxvi. 22); and in Rom. x. 5-19 the apostle refers to the address in Deuteronomy xxx. and the song in Deuteronomy xxxii. These passages maintain that certain prophecies came from Moses, but do not maintain that the Pentateuch, as a whole, or the narratives in which these prophecies occur, were written by Moses.  

Here, again, the professor takes one of the most explicit of the testimonies of Jesus, and, instead of attempting, in a direct manner, to refute the argument that is based upon it, mixes it up with a number of less explicit passages, and tosses them all aside as ascribing only certain prophecies to Moses. The passage thus treated can be styled a mere ascription of a certain prophecy to Moses only by ignoring au essential part of it. It reads thus: "For if ye believed Moses, ye would believe me, for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" "His writings!" What were meant by these? What writings did his hearers necessarily understand him to mean? There is no answer but one; he meant those Writings known to his hearers and to us as the writings of Moses. He meant the Pentateuch; and I venture to say that Professor Briggs can not squarely face these words and deny it. He was not ignorant of these words when ho wrote his book; why did he not face them squarely, and show, if he could, that they have a meaning consistent with his theory? I should be clad to see him or some of his friends undertake the task even now. I invite them to it,  

The true method of treating all the sayings of Jesus and the apostles on this subject is to ascertain from some unambiguous utterances precisely what they taught, and then to interpret their other utterances in harmony with these. This I have endeavored to do; and by this process it is made clear that, when they speak of any law, statute, prediction, or other sayings of Moses, they contemplate it as a part of the writing then and since ascribed to Moses; i. e., the Pentateuch.  

Ten years later than the publication of Biblical Study, the work from which I have copied Professor Briggs' arguments thus far, he published a smaller book entitled Higher Criticism of the Pentateuch, in which he goes over the same ground again. In it he reproduces, word for word, the three arguments on which I have commented; but he has some additional matter to which, in justice to him, I should perhaps pay attention.  

But some one will say, Was It not the common opinion In the days of our Lord that Moses wrote the Pentateuch? We answer that, so far as we know, it was the common opinion that David wrote the Psalter. As to the Pentateuch, opinion was divided whether it was lost when the temple was destroyed hy the king of Babylon, and restored or recast by Ezra or not (p. 28).  

What kind of reasoning is this? He answers the question whether the Jews thought that Moses wrote the Pentateuch by stating that, "so far as we know, they thought that David wrote the Psalter." If I were asked, Has it not been the common opinion that Professor Briggs wrote Biblical Study, and were to answer, So far as we know, it was once the common opinion that Shakespeare wrote Mother Goose's Melodies, the answer would be equally relevant. "So far as we know" ia well put in. It means that wo know nothing about it But Ave do know that no Jew of common sense who ever read the Psalter could have thought that David wrote the whole of it. And we do know, and Professor Briggs knows we know, that the Jews of our Lord's Day believed Moses to be the author of the Pentateuch. Even those who thought that the law was lost for a time and then restored by Ezra, if any of them lived this early, believed that it was originally written by Moses.  

Following this on the same page, the professor demands,. "Why should we interpret Jesus and his apostles by the opinions of the Jews of his time?" This question is easily answered. If I should step into the professor's classroom some day, and find him quoting to a class the Epistle to the Hebrews, and constantly saying with every quotation, Paul says this, and Paul says that, I might demand of him, "Professor, do you not know that all the members of this class have fallen into the mistake that Paul wrote this-epistle? And are you not confirming them in this false opinion by quoting it as Paul's?" I suppose he would turn upon me with indignation, and demand, "Why should I be interpreted by the opinions of this class?" Were I bold enough, my reply would be, "Why are you deceiving this class by propagating an opinion that you hold to be false?" This is the attitude in which his argument places Jesus.  

He says on the same page:  

If we should say that Jesus did not know whether Moses wrote the Pentateuch or not, we would not go beyond his own saying that he knew not the time of his own advent,  

This is as much as to say, that because Jesus says of himself that he did not know a certain thing, we may say of him that he did not know another and very different thing. Because Professor Briggs says that he does not know the day and hour when ho will die, I may say of him that he does not know who his grandmother was. I rather think that he did not know anything about logic when he was writing this sentence. All that he ever knew of logic, like Nebuchadnezzar's dream, has passed from him for the time being.  

One more quotation, taken from page 29, will bring us to the end of the professor's strange series of arguments, or, rather, of statements:  

If, on the other hand, any one should say, Jesus must have known, all things, and he ought not to have used language that might deceive men, we respond, that his language does not deceive men. Literary usage in all ages and in the Bible itself shows that it is equally truth and good language for the critics and the anti-critics. The question is, Shall we interpret the language of Jesus by the opinions of his contemporaries? This we deny. Jesus was not obliged to correct all the errors of his contemporaries. He did not correct their false views of science. He was the great Physician, but he did not teach medicine. He was greater than Solomon, and yet he declined to decide questions of civil law and politics. He never rebuked slavery. Is he responsible for slavery on that account? The Southern slaveholders used to say so. But even they are now convinced of their error.  

Let us take up this string of assertions, and see what is in them. First, "His language does not deceive men." True, if Moses "gave the law," and if the books of the Pentateuch were "his writings," as Jesus positively affirms; but false if these writings, as Professor Briggs teaches, were written several centuries after Moses died. Second, "Jesus was not obliged to correct all the errors of his contemporaries." But nobody ever said that he was. We only say that he did not and would not affirm as truths any of their errors. Third, "He did not correct any of their false views of science." Of course not; but if he had affirmed any of them, as he affirmed their view of the authorship of the Pentateuch, we should never have heard the last of it from the lips of infidels; and Professor Briggs would have been unable to defend him. Fourth, "He was a great Physician, but he did not teach medicine." True; but suppose he had taught the false medical notions of his day, what would all of our M. D.'s of the present day have had to say? Suppose he had taught what some people now call Christian Science! Fifth, "He declined to decide questions of civil law and politics." Yes; but suppose he had decided them. Suppose he had decided in favor of free silver at the ratio of 16 to 1; what would the gold-bugs have to say? And what a plank his decision would have been in the Democratic platform! Sixth, "He never rebuked slavery. Is he responsible for slavery on that account?" Of course not; and the Southern slaveholders never said he was. The only said what Professor Briggs says, that he never rebuked it. But suppose he had said that slavery was right, just as he said that Moses gave the law; what then? How then could Professor Briggs have said that slavery was wrong? And how can he now say that Moses did not give the law? He could have said the former only by denying the authority of Jesus, and this is the only way in which he can say the latter.  

5. Did the Apostles Affirm? We have seen, in the preceding section, that Jesus 'our Lord most positively and explicitly affirmed the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. For proof of the fact that Moses was its author we need to go no further, for with believers in Christ no other proof can make stronger an explicit assertion by him. But lest, in the mind of some reader, the explicitness of his affirmations has not been made perfectly clear, we proceed to show how his apostles expressed themselves, and to show in this way both what they were led by the Holy Spirit to say, and how they understood the utterances on this subject of their divine Master. I am aware that with some persons who claim to attach full credit to the utterances of Christ, the testimony on such a question given by the apostles has little or no weight. The cry "Back to Christ," which has been of late shouted so vociferously, is by some, whose shout is the loudest, meant not only for the disregard of all authority this side of the New Testament, but of apostolic authority as well. It means that nothing in the New Testament is to be regarded by them as authoritative except the personal utterances of Jesus himself. It means that even these are not to be regarded as authority until the reports of them in our Gospels pass through the crucible of "modern criticism," to determine whether they have been faithfully delivered. But this professed exaltation of Christ is in reality a disparagement of him; for it is his own authority which affirms the authority of his apostles, promising them infallible guidance, and saying to them, "He that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me." On this point I am glad to quote again an utterance by Professor Briggs, who says: "The authority of Jesus Christ to all who know him to be their divine Saviour, outweighs all other authority whatever. A Christian man must follow his teachings in all things as the guide into all truth. The authority of Jesus Christ is involved in that of the apostles." No man who accepts this dictum can think of making the distinction of which, we speak; and no man who credits what Jesus says about the inspiration of the apostles, or regards what they say of their own inspiration as anything more than idle boasting, can call this dictum in question. We proceed, then, to cite the testimony of the apostles with full confidence that it will be implicitly credited by all but rationalists.  

The apostle Peter shall be our first witness. In his second recorded sermon, he says: "Moses indeed said, A prophet shall the Lord God raise up unto you from among your brethren, like unto me; to him shall ye hearken in all things whatsoever he shall speak unto you. And it shall be, that every soul, which shall not hearken to that prophet, shall be utterly destroyed from among the people." This is a free extract from Deuteronomy (xviii. 15-19); and Peter testifies that it was spoken by Moses. It is part of one of the speeches ascribed to Moses in that book. It is conceded that Peter's hearers credited the whole speech and the whole Book of Deuteronomy as having come from Moses; and as Peter uses the passage to show them that Moses predicted the coming of Jesus, his argument was both fallacious in itself, and deceptive to his hearers, if the book had any other origin. No ingenuity can set aside this conclusion or destroy the force of it.  

Our next witness is the apostle John. In the first chapter of his Gospel, after setting forth the pre-existence and the advent of Jesus, and quoting a brief testimonial from John the Baptist, he says: "The law was given by Moses; grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." Here is the same testimony given by Jesus himself in a slightly different form. It is a positive affirmation that the law was given by Moses; and the person of Moses as the giver of the law is put in antithesis with the person of Christ as the bestower of grace and truth. Notice, further, it is not some particular law or statute that is spoken of, but "the law"—an expression which always in the speech of the Jews meant the work which we call the Pentateuch. John, then, was mistaken, and he misleads the readers of his Gospel, whether Jews or Gentiles, if the Pentateuch did not came from the hand of Moses.  

The testimony of Paul is equally explicit . I shall use only one testimonial from him. In contrasting the righteousness of the law with that obtained through faith in Christ, he says: "For Moses writeth that the man that doeth the righteousness which is of the law shall live thereby." Here Moses is represented as the writer; and what he is said to have written is not some particular sentence; for the words Paul uses are not found in the Pentateuch, but they set forth the substance of what Moses taught in reference to righteousness and the life which it secures. It is, then, an assertion that the law in general was written by Moses, and, in arguing thus to Jewish readers whom he had especially in mind, Paul must be understood as using the term in the sense ascribed to it by the Jews. It is an assertion that Moses was the writer of the law, as explicit as the assertion by John that Moses gave the law.  

The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, who, I confidently believe, after having studied all the arguments to the contrary, was Paul, makes a greater number of assertions of the Mosaic authorship than any other New Testament writer, and with those who believe that this epistle had an inspired source, the authority of its author is not inferior to that of Peter and John. But if any question can be settled by the authority of inspired apostles, this one is already settled by the statements of Peter, John and Paul.