TENDENCY THEORY, THE. A theory concerning the composition of the New Testament writings, asso ciated chiefly with the name of the German critic, F. C. Baur (1792-1860). The use of the word " tendency " in this connection (Tendenz) is German rather than Eng lish. A Tendenz-schrift is " a piece of writing written with a (polemical) purpose "; a Tendenz-roman is what we call "a novel with a purpose." F. C. Baur claimed to show that the New Testament writings are not purely historical, but were written with a purpose (Tendenz). The first Christians were soon divided into two parties, Jewish Christians and Pauline Christians. Each was rather bitterly opposed to the other; and there was a fundamental opposition between Paul and the original apostles. The New Testament writers are supposed to share in this conflict, and often to write with the purpose of supporting the claims of the one party or the other. In Baur's criticism, " each book was assigned its position in time and space by reason of the conscious relation of its author to the supposed mortal conflict between the two wings of Apostolic Christianity " (H. S. Nash).
There was, of course, an element of truth in Baur's con tention. Unless we adhere to the old idea of verbal inspiration, it is hardly possible not to admit that to some extent the New Testament writers, like all writers of this class of works, are likely to have written with a special purpose or tendency (Tendenz). But in the sense in which Baur pressed the theory, the matter was greatly exaggerated. He did a service, however, in calling attention to the tendency and in putting people on their guard. Herbert Spencer has done a similar service in pointing out (Study of Sociology) that in every field of study—in Science as well as in Theology—this tendency or bias has to be guarded against. See R. W. Mackay, The Tilbingen School and its Antecedants, 1863; H. S. Nash, Higher Criticsm of the N.T., 1901.