《Fundamental Christian Theology (Vol. 2)》
A Systematic Theology
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Part IIIChapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Part IV
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Part V
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
PART III -- ANTHROPOLOGY
The Origin of Man; His Fall, and the Consequent Ruin of the Race.
Chapter 1
ORIGIN AND UNITY OF MAN
The doctrine of Anthropology which a theologian holds, is fundamental. It decides all his after theology. The whole system of the doctrines of salvation depends upon this foundation. It has a direct relation to the incarnation of Christ and all the work of redemption. Let these fundamentals be insecure and unscriptural, and a sentimental, flabby, liberal theology will compose the superstructure. Such a deplorable result is well-nigh inevitable. Thus questions of the nature and origin and early history of man are not simply of speculative interest, but are intrinsic and determining. If our present state is the same as our primitive state, or if there has been no moral lapse of the race, and its only fall has been "a fall upward," then there never was any need of Christ's redemptive mediation, and no necessity for regeneration or sanctification by the Holy Spirit. But if man has fallen, and the race is depraved, then we need a Divine Savior, to make atonement for us, and a Divine Spirit to secure our renewal and cleansing of heart. And so we stand on the threshold of the great truths of the Christian system.
1. THERE ARISES THE QUESTION OF THE ORIGIN OF MAN. There are three theories of evolution. 1. The first is purely materialistic and utterly atheistic. One advocate of this theory declares that "there is no room for God in the universe." Everything has been evolved by the movement of natural forces. Matter is the only real being, and is eternal. It first existed as a universally diffused fire-mist and somehow it went to whirling; and somehow it whirled into order and beauty and life.
2. Another theory permits the banished Creator to appear once on the scene and create a few living germs! How kind! Darwin thought that a few simple forms of life were the sum-total of the product of divine energy. From this inception the whole process of evolution is purely naturalistic. Even man is the outcome of this process.
3. A third party has held that God was not only active, in the creation of life, but has continued his agency through the whole process of evolution. Some have been theistic enough to hold that evolution is the method of God's creative work, his agency continuing through the whole process. Hence, say they, in the evolution of new species, mere natural force is supplanted by divine energy. Especially is this true in the case of man. Here again is a wide divergence of views, some holding that the human body is a product of evolution, and only the mind is a special creation of God, while others maintain that body and mind alike are the immediate creation of the Almighty.
When we open the Bible we get relief from these uncertainties of human speculation. In the earlier creations God said, "Let there be," "Let the earth bring forth," "Let the waters bring forth," "God spake and it was done." But when we come to man, it is more marked still. "Let us make man," as if the Trinity were united in the great work. "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." The plain sense of such words places man above all other orders as a spiritual and Godlike personality. To this being so "wonderfully made" in the image of his Maker, is given dominion over all the lower orders. The distinction between the soul and body is made plain in the more detailed account, "And the Jehovah God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."
It will be observed from the above what an important subject this is in its far-reaching influence. "With the first theory of a purely naturalistic evolution and inclusive of man as of all other orders of being, no place remains for any form of theology. Outright materialism is the only ground of such an evolution; and outright materialism is outright atheism. With atheism, a theology" (Miley, Vol. I, p. 357). By the second theory which kindly permits God to start life, but has no further use for Him in the origin of species not even in the origin of man, there can be no place for doctrinal anthropology or Christian theology. Man, as we have been accustomed to think of him, is lost, fallen to the dead level of cows and crows, and without any distinguishing excellence in himself. The theory removes God so far away, and has so little use for Him, that, like the first it is practically atheistic. No theory, which denies the transcendent and immediate agency of God in the creation of man leaves any basis for a Christian theology.
The third form of evolution, which admits that the mind of I man at least is not a product of evolution but is the result of a special act of creation, does leave sufficient place for God to make a foundation for doctrinal theology and anthropology and Christology.
But, as we have previously shown in our discussion of evolution, the day has passed when theologians need to be swerved from their true orbit of thought by any influence from this fad of modern science. It has been rejected and utterly scouted by the most eminent minds in the scientific world. Miley well says: "There is no urgency for haste in making terms with modern evolution. It is only an hypothetic structure without the substance of a science. With limitless assumption and dogmatism it lacks the material for the foundation of a science. There must be long waiting for the superstructure. The evolution of the human race is wholly without proof, and the sheerest assumption. There is the broad margin between man and the highest order below him-confessedly too broad for crossing by a single transition in the process of evolution. All search for connecting links is utterly fruitless. That broad margin remains without the slightest token of successive stages in the transition across to man. The Bible account of his origin in the creative agency of God remains, and will remain, the only rational account. The grounds-of a theological anthropology remain secure" (Vol. I, p. 358).
II. THERE ARISES THE QUESTION OF THE TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIN. Scientists are agreed, with the Bible, that of all living orders, man was the last created.
But of the date of his appearance on the earth,
1. We observe that scientists differ so remarkably among themselves, that it at least brings no credit to science. It strikingly illustrates the fact that much that is called science is nothing but wild speculation. For instance, Professor Lyell argued that "two hundred thousand years at least should be allowed for human life on earth." Wallace is comparatively moderate, but asks for a great stretch of time; "We can with tolerable certainty affirm that man must have inhabited the earth a thousand centuries ago, but we cannot assert that he positively did not exist, or that there is any good evidence against his having existed for a period of ten thousand centuries" (1,000,000 years). Professor Hunt advanced the opinion that man has been on earth not fewer than nine million years. Haeckel modestly estimates that it required not fewer than a thousand million years to evolve man from the lower forms of organized life, and not fewer than several hundred thousand years to lift him out of the brute condition from which he has been developed." The Frenchman, M. Lalonde, not to be outdone by these ambitious rivals for notoriety, "and not able to think of any way, scientifically, for starting the human family, he reached the sage conclusion that man was not started at all, and therefore is eternal." Lord Kelvin humorously remarks that these evolutionists are very prodigal of time, like worthless spendthrifts, who have suddenly inherited a large fortune and are industriously scheming how to spend it. On the other hand, sober Christian scientists, in great numbers agree with Winchell that "man has no place in earth until after the ice-age." "The very beginnings of our race are almost in sight." As we have pointed out in the previous chapter, a great number of scientists of the highest rank place the advent of man as not more remote than from 8,000 to 12,000 years ago. We may name Professor Haynes, M. Reinach, Le Conte, Professor Holmes, Professor Edward Hall, Boyd, Dawkins, Gandry, Evans, M. Favre, Professors G. Frederick Wright, Prestwick, Adhimar, Croll, Salisbury, Upham, Winchell, Dawson, Hanson, Andrews, and many others.
2. This view makes no conflict with Bible chronology. The advent of man preceded the birth of Christ, according to the calculations of Archbishop Ussher, by 4,004 years, on the ground of the Hebrew Scriptures. But the Septuagint version, as reckoned by Hales, makes the time 5,411 years. Others have made the distance in time longer still. This uncertainty is no recent assumption, no device forced upon the biblical chronologist by the demands of science; it has long been felt. The tables of genealogy are the chief data in the case, and their aim is to trace the lines of descent, not to mark the succession of years. A careful study of the genealogies shows that it is said here and there that a man begot his grandchildren or even his great grandchildren, or a woman, bare them. "Thus in Gen. 46: 18 after recording the sons of Zilpah, and her grandsons and great-grandsons, it is added, 'and these are the sons of Zilpah and these she bare unto Jacob, even sixteen souls.' In Matt. 1: 11 Josiah begot his grandson Jechonias; and in verse 8, Joram begot his great-grandson Uzziah. In the Bible sense then 'to bear' and 'to beget' means to give descent, and whole generations were passed over. The tables were genealogical and not chronological. Thus no biblical chronology can have any doctrinal claim; so the usual reckoning may be extended to meet any reasonable requirements of scientific fact" (Miley).
"The extreme uncertainty attending all attempts to determine the chronology of the Bible is sufficiently evinced by the fact that one hundred and eighty different calculations have been made by Jewish and Christian authors, of the length of the period between Adam and Christ. The longest of these make it six thousand nine hundred and eighty-four years, and the shortest, three thousand, four hundred and eighty-three. Under these circumstances it is very clear that the friends of the Bible have no occasion for uneasiness. If the facts of science or of history should ultimately make it necessary to admit that eight or ten thousand years have elapsed since the creation of man, there is nothing in the Bible in the way of such concession. The Scriptures do not teach us how long men have existed on the earth. Their tables of genealogy were intended to prove that Christ was the Son of David and of the seed of Abraham, and not how many years had elapsed between the creation and the advent" (Hodge).
3. The evidence of the brutal character of primitive man is utterly wanting. As he came from the hands of his Creator, he was as mature in his mind as in his body, and with a language super-naturally given. By divine help he came quickly to a knowledge of nature and language. And, as now, this divinely taught language was transmitted from generation to generation. Multiplication of languages was by variation, just as they are multiplied now. "There are no facts in the history of the race which require the pure originality of more than one language." It does not require so much time to make new languages as might be supposed. They form very rapidly. "Thus on the breaking up of the Roman Empire and the distribution of the people into separate nationalities their common language was soon transformed into the Romance-such as the French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. These languages now spoken by so many peoples, are not a thousand years old, and only the fraction of a thousand was required for their formation. It is the conclusion of Southall that of some five thousand languages now spoken only a half dozen are a thousand years old. If such is the work of ten centuries, no valid argument can be based on the multiplicity of languages for any great antiquity of man" (Miley, Vol. I, pp. 367, 368).
4. Another argument for the great antiquity of man is based on the distinction of races. The different races confessedly appeared very early in history. It is argued that only a very long time could have produced them. It must be granted that, on the theory of the unity of the race, more time would be required, than on the theory of an original plurality of races, or origins which of course require no extra time.
But wide variations in plants and animals can be produced in a brief time, and man is quite as susceptible to change. Buckle showed that every degree of latitude and every hundred feet of elevation above the sea wrought a slow but sure and perceptible change in the nature of man. Men early were widely separated and came into different climatic and food conditions. Prichard shows, in Natural History of Man, that "races of men are subjected more than almost any race of animals to the varied agencies of climate. Civilization produces even greater changes in their condition than does domestication in the inferior tribes. We may, therefore, expect to find full as great diversities in the races of men as in the domestic breeds. The influence of mind must be still more extensive and powerful in its operations upon human beings than upon brutes. And this difference transcends all analogy or comparison" (p. 75).
This is a question that concerns theology, because with the existence of our race on the earth, as many have supposed, only six thousand years, the unity of the race, on which Pauline theology depends, cannot be maintained. This is rendered impossible by the early appearance of the deepest variations of race. Therefore an extension of time beyond the generally received biblical chronology should be received with favor. As Argyll said: "As we value our belief in the unity of the race ought we to be willing to accept a greater antiquity for man than the dates in our Old Testament would indicate. The greater antiquity favors the unity of the race.
III. EVIDENCE FOR THE UNITY OF MAN.
1. Quaterfages defines species thus: "Species is a collection of individuals more or less resembling each other, which may be regarded as having descended from a single primitive pair, by an uninterrupted and natural succession of families." To this Jussieu and Linnaeus agree: "A species is the perennial succession of similar individuals in continued generations. The species is the chain of which the individuals are the links."
There are, then, two fundamental facts in species-resemblance and genetic connection. The doctrine may vary as it emphasizes one or the other; but these basal facts remain. The deeper idea is that of genealogical connection, which must be constant and complete.
2. Louis Agassiz, a most illustrious name in science, although openly opposed to evolution, was a devout theist. He held to separate and distinct origins for the human races,, all of them alike created by God.
Some naturalistic evolutionists, also, hold to separate origins of the several human races. If such an origin of man is possible there may have been a plurality of origins. If the natural conditions might meet in one point for the evolution of man, they might meet in several places. And, say they, if the environment is a strongly molding force over all forms of life, the widely different conditions of human evolutions would be sufficient to account for the different races. But, it is objected, that some of the most diverse and widely separated races are easily traced back to an earlier connection, while decisive facts warrant the inference of an original unity.
There are wide variations of racial type, particularly in size, form and color. Hence the question arises whether these differences are consistent with a common parentage. It is a question of great interest to scientists, and one in which they are by no means agreed, not even as to the number of races. "The scale runs from four to five up to sixty or more, but the weight of scientific authority is for a unity of origin" (Miley). Manifestly a wide range of difference is compatible with unity of species. It is declared by Quater-fages that men differ less widely than plants and animals of the same species; "the limits of variations are almost always more extensive between certain races of animals than between the most distinct human groups. Consequently, however great the differences existing between these human groups may be, or may appear to be, to consider them as specific characters is a perfectly arbitrary estimation of their value. It is quite as rational, quite as scientific, to consider these differences only as characters of race, and even on that account to refer all the human groups to a single species."