In opposition to this theory are various others, all of which impose certain limits upon the perfection of Scripture. Some confine inspiration to all that is directly relig ious in the Bible, to all that is directly of the character of revelation, leaving out of the question all that belongs to the sphere of science or ordinary history. Others exempt the form or letter of Scripture, and attribute inspiration only to its spirit, ideas, or doc trines. Others go still further, and comprise in the fallible form the mode of argument and expository details. "Each of these theories supposes inspiration to be connected primarily with the authors rather than with the books of Scripture, sometimes with the extraordinary gifts accompanying the first preachers of the Word of God, sometimes with the peculiar privileges of prophets or apostle, and sometimes with their special position as immediate witnesses of the facts of revelation and their singular religious aptitude. Whatever differences may characterize the advocates of these respective views, it is plain that they, one and all, have abandoned the ground of the absolute infallibility of the letter of Scripture.
In a matter of controversy like the present, it is not our function to determine in favor of any particular view, but simply to indicate what the more important opinions are, and the grounds on which they are held. Those who claim for the letter of the Bible a freedom from all error or imperfection, do so on the it priori ground of neces sity; such infallibility is held to be implied in the very idea of a revelation of the divine will; while those passages which seem inconsistent with the facts of science or of his tory, or with other parts of the Bible itself, admit, it is maintained, of satisfactory explanation. For such reconciliations of apparent discrepancies our readers are referred to the current commentaries and harmonies. Those theologians, again, who deny the necessity of infallibility, and hold that the inconsistencies referred to never- have and never can be satisfactorily explained away (and their number has been for sonic time on the increase), argue in the following way: it is plain, first of all, and especially, that the question is not one to be settled according to any preconception, but according to the evidence of the facts given us in Scripture. The only right idea of inspiration is, as one has said, "that which we form from our knowledge of the Bible itself. It is a question to be solved not by speculating what the Bible ought to be. but by examining what it actually is." All a priori arguments are evidently at once inapplicable and dangerous on such a subject. The partisans of plenary inspiration maintain that it is
necessary to the preservation of faith to hold, that God has not only revealed time truth to man, but that lie has deposited that truth in an infallible record. Not only so: but the infallibility of tho canon is no less indispensable; for all would be lost if any doubt was allowed to rest upon any portion of the Word of God. But if an infallible text and an infallible canon be necessary, why not also an infallible interpretation? Without the latter, the two former may be of no use. All may be lost by a false or defective com mentary of the sacred text. It is plain that the idea of verbal inspiration cannot stop short of the conclusion of an infallible interpretation; and even such a conclusion, which upsets Protestantism, by denying the right of free inquiry, would not save it; for an infallible commentary would not necessarily insure infallible instruction—all might still be lost by the weakness, ignorance, or defect of the recipient mind. No infallibility of text, of canon. or even of interpretation, could insure the infallible reception of the truth, thus trebly guarded. If we would not be caught. then, in this absurd chain of assumption, we must break its first link, and ask, not what the Bible must be or should be, but what it is. This view is strongly argued in a recent treatise en inspiration by M. de Pressense, one of the most distinguished of the French Protest ant divines belonging to the evangelical school of theology. According to this writers who may be taken as the representative of a large class of theological thinkers, the Pihle is a mass of documents of varying age and varying authenticity; its text has undergone the usual changes attending the transmisSIon of historical documents; it is marked by the usual inequalities and varieties of style that we meet with in any other collection of ancient literature; it presents in many cases peculiar difficulties, differences and even contradictions of detail, scientific and historical errors. All who have studied the gospels minutely, and especially the quotations in the gospels and the epistles of St. Paul from the Old Testament, know that there are various inaccuracies and inisappliea tions of facts throughout them. The same microscope of criticism that reveals to us the depths of the inner meaning of' the divine message in all its manifold fullness, reveals to us also the imperfections, and even the contradictions, of the human messenger. The following are only a few of the instances in winch such "imperfections and contradic tions" show themselves.