Limitations of Scholarship

Fundamental Evangelistic Association
selected articles from:
^{^{^©}}FOUNDATION
A MAGAZINE OF BIBLICAL FUNDAMENTALISM
Dennis W. Costella, Editor; Karel Beyer, Production Manager; Matt Costella, Copy Editor
M.H. Reynolds, Jr. (1919-1997), Founding Editor

The Limitations Of Scholarship

by David R. Breed, D.D., LL.D

[Dr. David Breed wrote this article early in the twentieth century. He served as professor of homiletics at Western Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Dr. Breed was an outspoken defender of the fundamentals of the faith. However, liberalism had already begun to creep into Western Theological Seminary while Dr. Breed served on the faculty. Eventually, the seminary fell prey to the liberal higher criticism and destructive scholarship of which Dr. Breed exposes in this helpful article. Sadly, this same destructive spirit of higher criticism has not only destroyed many theological institutions in the past, but it is crippling evangelical schools even today.]

I

WRITE THIS ARTICLE for the sake of certain timid Christians who are well aware of the fact that they have little scholarship of their own and are consequently quite apprehensive with regard to the outcome of the scholarship of others. They are alarmed at what appears to be the trend of religious thought at the present time and fear lest the foundations of their Christian faith be shaken. I would attempt to quiet their alarms.

Before proceeding, let me make this introductory remark: Scholarship is of two kinds—constructive and destructive. Christianity owes much to constructive scholarship. Its service of recent years has been great and conspicuous, and nothing which appears in this article is intended to belittle or disparage it. Neither is it intended to reflect upon scholarship which is pursued for its own sake—the simple advancement of learning in various fields of thought.

I.

Let this be carefully noted to begin with: that scholarship never discovered any great spiritual truth accompanying salvation, least of all any of the fundamental truths of the Christian system.

There were many profound thinkers in classic and other lands who gave careful and prolonged thought to religious subjects, but apart from the knowledge which they derived from the Scriptures, they remained in great uncertainty regarding spiritual truth. "The world through its wisdom knew not God." Whatever may be one's notion concerning the divine inspiration of the Bible, it remains that all we hold of religious conviction that is worth holding is derived from It. And if we were today to be deprived of the Bible and our knowledge of Its contents were to be forgotten, scholarship would be absolutely impotent to restore It, and satisfy the hunger of our souls.

The apostle Paul himself was a great scholar, but he testified concerning the Gospel which he preached, "It is not after man, for neither did I receive It from man, nor was I taught It, but It came to me through revelation of Jesus Christ."

Such being the case, it is not possible for scholarship to discredit any revealed truth except to those who do not themselves embrace it. Those who have embraced it will continue to retain it be cause it is received and retained by the soul in just the same manner as in the case of the apostle Paul, though the miraculous element be lacking.

It is the product of experience—a real, deep, convincing experience promoted by the supernatural, and it cannot be set aside, therefore, by any process of reasoning whatsoever.

Those who have enjoyed such an experience have a knowledge of the truth beyond all that scholarship can convey to them and which scholarship cannot dislodge. And it is genuine knowledge. Yes, I may even say genuine scholarship, for scholarship is of two kinds: that of learning—books, research, investigation and the like; and that of experience—intuition', meditation and converse with the divine.

So, then, those whose textbook scholarship is deficient may often confidently say, "I know." Unbelieving scholarship may attempt to convince them that they do not know and persuade them to recant, as it did with the man born blind, but the believer will continue to answer as did the blind man, "One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see."

II.

Note again, that a certain so-called scholarship, instead of discovering and promoting truth, often prevents its discovery and stands in the way of its promotion. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools." So the apostle explains the loss of the knowledge of God. Again he says: "We speak God's wisdom in a mystery... which none of the rulers of this world hath known, for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory."

Jesus was grateful that His disciples had not the wisdom on which their rulers prided themselves. He thanked His Father for this: "I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that Thou didst hide these things from the wise and understanding and didst reveal them unto babes." Note the same distinction that St. Paul made. "These things," of which Jesus spake, were not taught His disciples but were "revealed" to them.

I have heard it maintained that "heretics" deserve our sympathy rather than our condemnation because they are generally "seekers after truth."

But the Bible does not say so. Indeed, It says the very reverse. No doubt some who have been led astray and who may be called "heretics" are honestly seeking the truth. But the great majority of such are seeking rather to evade the truth, particularly that truth which condemns them as sinners, with no hope but in the blood of Jesus Christ the Crucified.

Paul says of the heathen world that "they refused to have God in their knowledge" and that they "became vain in their reasonings and their senseless heart was darkened." The whole trend of Scripture is in the same line. Infidelity is first of all willful perversity.

We cannot expect, therefore, that such scholarship will do anything to help the cause of truth. It never has. It does not wish to do so. It desires rather to establish the truth of the unproven and erroneous. Paul says, "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie."

Yet I have heard it said that if evolution is ever shown to be false, it will not be by preachers and Sunday school teachers, but by evolutionists themselves. Perhaps this is true, so far as the evolutionists themselves are concerned. But meanwhile, there will be some devout evolutionists who will be concerned for the faith, and meanwhile many preachers and Sunday school teachers and others, who are not learned in science, will refuse to accept that extreme materialistic evolution which cannot be reconciled with what they believe to be revealed truth.

III.

Note again, that we need not be at all disturbed by the aspersions of a certain scholarship which derides the ignorance of many who maintain their faith. So it has always been. "Dost thou teach us?" they cry, just as the rulers did to the blind man. So, also, the officers who were sent to arrest Jesus returned without Him, giving as their reason, "Never man so spake." But that was no reason to the members of their high court, and they ridiculed them. "Are ye also led astray? Hath any of the rulers believed on him? or of the Pharisees? But this multitude that knoweth not the law are accursed." But notice that Nicodemus, however, seemed to think differently, apparently believing that the officers who had heard Jesus were nearer the truth than the judges who had not heard Him and who had not given Him the chance to speak for Himself.

It was the same later on when the rulers held an informal meeting to try Peter and John. They "perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men," and they "marveled." But that was all. They would have convicted them had not the lame man, whom Peter and John had healed, been standing by. He was their unanswerable argument. And so it is today: the healed men and women—cured of their sin and their sorrow—are our witnesses.

It is to the everlasting shame of these same rulers that they even discredited Jesus Himself, saying, "How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?" Jesus Himself was not a

"scholar," and He did not claim to be. No one, then, need hesitate to stand with Peter and John, with Jesus Himself.

IV.

Note again, that those who have not much scholarship are yet fully competent to sit in judgment on that which scholarship offers.

There are some scholars who vehemently deny this. They maintain that unless people have studied their books and mastered their learning and, in short, coincide with their opinions, they are not scholars. Little weight is to be attached to their notions. The conclusions of these "unlearned and ignorant men" are without value, and their criticism of scholarship is absurd.

Nevertheless, the jury in all those matters that concern religion has always been largely composed of the "unlearned and ignorant," and their verdict always has been and always will be final. The case is submitted to them; they hear the evidence; they are informed with regard to the law; they become intelligent and competent, and with them rests the issue.

Jesus Christ said as much as this when He told the Jews, "My teaching is not Mine, but His that sent Me. If any man willeth to do His will, he shall, know of the teaching, whether it is of, God or whether I speak from Myself." It is not scholarship, then, which renders one competent to decide whether a doctrine is from God or not, but honest devotion to the will of God.

V.

Note finally, that all this becomes the more manifest and emphatic when we remember that the history of scholarship is largely the record of mistakes. In times past, the astrologers and alchemists were reckoned as the scholars of the world, and it may be that there are some like vagaries today that pass for scholarship. At all events in view of all the scientific and philosophic theories that have been proposed, elaborated, defended and accepted, only to be at length questioned, amended, and often abandoned, it behooves scholarship to be much more humble and much less dogmatic than some of it is at present.

The fundamental truths of revelation have endured through many generations. These have seen many assumptions of scholarship come and go; again and again the very mistakes of scholarship have contributed to their confirmation, and he is a very foolish Christian who will surrender any of them to an unbelieving scholarship which offers no positive proof of its claims.

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