The Bible addresses itself from faith to faith. The Old Testament writings, according to the New Testament, were given in order to bear witness to Christ (John 5:39), to unfold the way of salvation, and to provide the man of God with the spiritual equipment he needs for Christian life and service (2 Tim. 3:15 ff.). And if this is true of the Old Testament writings, it is true a fortiori of the New Testament writings. There is considerable point to the often repeated statement that the avowed purpose of the Fourth Gospel is the primary purpose of all the New Testament writings: “these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:31).

It is a basic evangelical tenet that, if the biblical writings do not lead us to faith in Christ, their primary purpose has not been accomplished in us. However much we may study them for other ends, however much we may value them for their religious content, yet without faith in the Christ of whom they speak we are in the position of those to whom the charge of Christ himself came that while they searched the sacred writings to find true life there, they could not attain it because they would not come to him, to whom those writings pointed as the giver of life.

FAITH AND CRITICISM

Evangelical Christians accordingly believe that it is in the way of faith that the Bible’s true purpose is fulfilled and its inmost meaning grasped. But the question then arises about the relation between the appropriation of the Bible message by faith and the study of the Bible and its message by means of the various critical disciplines. No doubt there are many Christian believers who are content to hear the voice of God in the Bible assuring them that in Christ he has brought salvation to them. The witness of the Holy Spirit in their hearts assures them that they have not followed cunningly devised fables in accepting the Gospel as the way of life. Problems raised by the critical study of the Bible do not trouble them, and they find it difficult to understand how any believer can be troubled by such things when the eternal verities stand forth in the Bible with all their self-authenticating power. Again, there are eminent theologians, no mean practitioners in the critical arts, who assure us that criticism and faith are so unrelated that even a critical method which reduces the historical content of the Gospel story almost to the vanishing-point need present no obstacle to belief in the real and abiding essence of the Gospel. Such an assurance makes little appeal to the simpler believers whom we have already mentioned, and from another point of view it makes little appeal to people of more sophisticated mind whose training has been in other fields than the theological.

The following remarks will be confined to the realm of New Testament criticism, partly because of its cruciality, partly because of the writer’s private interests, and partly because readers of CHRISTIANITY TODAY have recently had the opportunity of digesting some thoughts about Old Testament criticism in an article by Cyrus H. Gordon (“Higher Critics and Forbidden Fruit,” Nov. 23, 1959, issue). Fortunately the sense of “commitment” to JEDP, of which Dr. Gordon speaks, is less widely found today—at least in those lands with which I am most familiar. A number of scholars who recognize that Wellhausen’s account of the development of Israel’s religion is untenable continue for practical purposes to make use of the fourfold documentary analysis associated with his name (although the fourfold analysis, as distinct from its chronological arrangement, is much older than Wellhausen). One of these scholars—the most eminent in the Old Testament field in England today—has described the literary aspect of Wellhausen’s view as “only a working hypothesis, which can be abandoned with alacrity when a more satisfying view is found, but which cannot with profit be abandoned until then” (H. H. Rowley, The Growth of the Old Testament, p. 46). That is the right way to treat any critical hypothesis, quite apart from the particular merits or demerits of this particular hypothesis. To be “committed” to any critical method or theory in that “deepest sense” in which Dr. Gordon uses the word is to mistake the means for the end, to think more highly of the scaffolding than of the building, to give the handmaid the honor that belongs to the mistress.

When we turn to the New Testament, two things must be emphasized at the outset. In the first place, the men who originally proclaimed the Christian message were eyewitnesses who maintained that the substance of their message was not only something that they believed and commended to the belief of others, but also something they had seen and heard. In the second place, they invited the closest scrutiny of their claims, because (as Paul said to the younger Agrippa) the events to which they attached saving significance had not been “done in a corner” (Acts 26:26). Nor did they suggest that the faith which they demanded involved a suspension of the critical faculty; on the contrary, they held that it produced a sharpening of the critical faculty; it is the man of faith, the “spiritual man,” who (according to Paul) is best able to pass judgment on all things (1 Cor. 2:15).

The New Testament affords no support to the widely entertained view that there is an essential tension between criticism and faith. We, for our part, are all too acutely aware of such a tension, but the New Testament encourages us to believe that the tension will disappear when our faith is more fully instructed and our criticism more wisely guided. There is something unsatisfactory in the situation of a theological professor (for example) who adopts a basically different attitude to the Bible when he preaches in church on Sunday morning from that which he adopts when he lectures in the classroom on Monday morning. That two quite different techniques are called for in the two places is obvious; but the wholly committed preacher who presents the Jesus of the Gospels to a Sunday congregation as the one and only Saviour cannot lecture on the Gospels to his students on Monday as if Jesus were of no more personal concern to himself or his hearers than Julius Caesar. Those who desire to know Christ “after the flesh,” to regard him “from a human point of view” (as the RSV puts it), objectively and dispassionately, will find disappointingly little material for their purpose in the New Tstament, for the New Testament writers were not concerned to give such a detached portrayal of Christ. And the Christ with whom the New Testament critic and exegete finds himself confronted is the Christ who is presented in these writings from faith to faith, and not until he sees Christ from the standpoint of faith will he begin to understand what the New Testament is about.

But when that happens, he will find that his faith imposes no inhibitions on his critical study of these writings. On the contrary, convinced as he is that all truth is God’s truth, and that “we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth” (2 Cor. 13:8), he can joyfully press the most rigorous critical investigations to their logical conclusion. The very fact of his basic sympathy with the New Testament writers enables him to do this the more effectively.

For example, he examines the four Gospels with their presentation of Christ. They are anonymous documents, although the traditional ascription of authorship in respect of all four will not be dismissed out of hand. One of them makes a direct claim to be based on eyewitness evidence, and a good case can be made out for tracing the testimony of eyewitnesses in some parts at least of the others. Their interdependence at a number of points, and their independence at others, combine to present him with a problem in literary relationships that calls for a solution in accordance with the relevant evidence. Some discussion of this very matter has appeared in recent months in CHRISTIANITY TODAY. Let me say in this regard that there is no a priori reason for holding one Gospel to be earlier and another later, for holding one to be a source of another and the latter to be dependent on the former. Nor can such questions be decided on statistical grounds alone. If Gospel A reproduces x per cent of the substance of Gospel B, it must be equally true that Gospel B reproduces y per cent of Gospel A. And the area of common agreement may result not from direct dependence one way or the other but from their dependence on a common source. Which direction the true solution lies has to be determined by the exercise of critical judgment after all the relevant data have been marshalled. And the wise critic will regard Q, L, M et hoc genus omne as working hypotheses, not as objects of faith; unlike the persons satirized many years ago by Ronald Knox, he will remember that the real documents are the four Gospels and will not be tempted to “trust the watchfulness of Blessed Q.” But in so far as the literary criticism of the Gospels enables him to envisage something of the way in which the story of Jesus was transmitted in the years preceding A.D. 60, it plays a useful part.

CONTEMPORARY FORM CRITICISM

Nowadays, however, it is not literary criticism but form criticism that seems to hold more promise of fruitful results. It must be pointed out that there is nothing necessarily subversive about form criticism in itself; if in some scholars’ hands it has appeared to lead to very skeptical conclusions, it will be found that these conclusions owe much more to the presuppositions of certain form critics than to the essential methods of form criticism. The outstanding service which form criticism has rendered is its demonstration that, no matter how we classify our Gospel material in order to subject it to critical scrutiny, no matter how far back into the oral period we press our research, the Jesus whom we meet is always the Sent One of God.

That the oral gospel preceded the written Gospels calls for no proof. And it is not only by the methods of form criticism that we can discern what that oral gospel was. Sufficient traces of it have been left in the New Testament Epistles and in the speeches of Acts to give us a rather clear impression of its main thrust. From the beginning, the story of Jesus was told as the consummating act in the history of God’s salvation. When Bible history, the history of salvation, is said to be different from other history, that is not to say that the things recorded in the history of salvation did not really happen, but that they cannot be fully verified by the ordinary canons of historical study. That Jesus of Nazareth was crucified under Pontius Pilate is a statement which the historian can verify by his customary methods; that he died for his people’s sins (as the apostolic preaching affirms) in the last resort can be verified only by those who have received forgiveness of sins through faith in him. That the tomb in which his crucified body was placed was empty on the third day thereafter is something which could have been verified at the time by anyone who cared to examine it; that he was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father is something which was verified in the experience of those to whom he manifested himself alive after his passion, and something which is still verified in the experience of those who know the spiritual power which comes through their sharing in his resurrection life. The apostolic preaching, the kerygma, which forms the kernel of the New Testament account of Christ, affirms both the things which the historian can verify and those which, as historian, he cannot verify. It proclaims events and interpretation together, but the event is real event and the interpretation is true interpretation.

While the form in which much of the Gospel material has been preserved may be explained in terms of a life-setting in the primitive Church, the material itself demands a life setting in the Palestinian ministry of Jesus. This is becoming increasingly clear with the widening frontiers of knowledge. The late C. C. Torrey’s exaggerated advocacy of original Aramaic Gospels should not blind us to the Aramaic substratum beneath all four Greek Gospels and their posited sources. The discoveries at Qumran promise background for our Gospels to an extent not dreamed of, with the result that features of the Gospels take on fresh significance.

The believing scholar should lead the quest for fuller understanding of the fundamental documents of our faith; he is the last man to be uneasy lest inconvenient facts should come to light. Where God’s revelation is in view, no facts are inconvenient.

Samuel M. Shoemaker is the author of a number of popular books and the gifted Rector of Calvary Episcopal Church in Pittsburgh. He is known for his effective leadership of laymen and his deeply spiritual approach to all vital issues.

Biblical criticism is a comparatively recent development in the history of the Christian Church. Beginning with the rise of rationalism in the seventeenth century under Spinoza and later with the Encyclopedists of the French Revolution, Christian scholars were confronted with the problems of the historical origins and validity of the biblical records. If, as their opponents contended, much of their content was a mass of legend, written at a time later than the traditional dates demanded, composed by men who possessed no first-hand knowledge of the facts, and carelessly copied by ignorant scribes, the genuineness and authority of the Bible would be seriously impaired. How could a jumbled miscellany of myths, shaped by the limited knowledge and concepts of an unenlightened or bigoted era, convey any imperative message that modern scientific thinkers would accept?

In the attempt to meet the attack, biblical criticism was developed as a science. The problem of the accurate transmission of the manuscript text was the province of textual (lower) criticism; the objections to its historicity and literary integrity became the battlefield of historical (higher) criticism. Unfortunately much of the rationalistic attitude of the Encyclopedists was perpetuated in the development of critical study. Many of its advocates rejected the authenticity and integrity of the biblical books, though they attempted to retain Christian faith while destroying its foundations.

Biblical higher criticism is not necessarily an assault on the Scriptures but is an examination of their historical and literary relation to the times and events concerning which they were written. The study is not in itself destructive; it can confirm and illuminate the biblical text just as well as it can cast doubt upon it or devaluate it. Insofar as historical and literary evidence can be used to find out exactly what the Bible means and to remove difficulties in understanding it, the study is beneficial. If it has been harmful, the fault is that of the critic rather than of the method.

In understanding the procedure of biblical criticism, however, we may ask what limits should be set for it? If the Scriptures are the Word of God, as evangelicals believe, are they not above criticism? Would not any challenge to their truthfulness or integrity be blasphemous impudence? Is not any questioning of the Bible a piece of impertinence?

Since the Bible was written by human beings who lived at definite times in definite places, its contents are related to the circumstances and localities in which it was produced. The historical events of which it speaks or from which it springs, the personalities who wrote it or whose deeds it chronicles, and the ideas that it contains are all a part of a setting to which other records and literature belong. A comparison between the facts and concepts in the Bible and those in contemporary literature may be a valuable means of interpreting its meaning for modern readers.

On the other hand, if the Bible is the revelation of God to men, it must be superior to any ordinary book. Not only must its teachings be reliable, but the historical framework in which they are contained must also be accurately set forth. Psychological truth can be conveyed by historical fiction, as many novels demonstrate, but the Bible does not purport to be fiction. The events which it narrates are recounted as actual happenings; its characters are treated as actual men and women; and its ideas are set forth as the Word of God to men. Even the characters in Jesus’ parables, which are obviously illustrative stories, seem to have been drawn from life, and may reproduce actual episodes in His knowledge. If we take the Bible at face value, it demands not only attention but also obedience. We dare not pervert or discredit it by an unwarranted mishandling of its text.

Where, then, shall biblical criticism begin, and where shall it stop? Can we commence the process of historical and literary evaluation, only to halt at a fixed point, because to go beyond it would be sacrilege? Can we curtail our investigations without placing an unwarranted curb on honest scholarship? Are there necessary bounds to criticism which the nature of the Bible requires?

In order to determine the proper sphere of biblical criticism, the following limitations are suggested:

LIMITATION OF INSPIRED CHARACTER

One should begin by recognizing the unique character of the Bible. Its dynamic is different from that of any other piece of writing that has survived from antiquity. The reality of this dynamic is amply attested by its effect on history. Throughout the period in which the Scriptures have been known and circulated, they have produced a moral impact upon men that cannot be duplicated by any other literature. The reading of the Law by Josiah moved the king to repentance and reform (2 Kings 22:10–13; 23:1–25); the public translation by Ezra stimulated a sweeping change in the conduct of the people (Neh. 8:1–6; 9:1–3); and in more recent times the Bible, wherever it has gone, has proved to be a potent force in promoting righteousness. Not all of its characters were morally upright, and not all of its history can serve as a model for behavior, but the standards by which it measures both those characters and that history are far above those of contemporaneous religious belief. Neither Homer, nor Plato, nor any other writer or philosopher has had the influence for moral change or given so lofty a concept of God as has the Bible.

Any criticism that seeks to explain the Bible must take this fact into account. To treat the Bible simply as the Hebrew-Christian contribution to the literary achievements of the race, neither better nor worse than the other surviving documents of antiquity, is to undervalue it and to ignore the most striking characteristic of the book. A criticism that does not allow for this dynamic and does not recognize its existence will necessarily draw partial, if not faulty conclusions. Such criticism will tell as much about the Bible as dissection of a corpse will tell about the living man. It fails to recognize the living quality of the Scriptures.

LIMITATION OF EVIDENCE

To conclude that the Bible is incorrect in its statements because it does not accord with the historical or scientific information that we possess overlooks the fact that not all the necessary evidence may be available. The narratives of the Bible do not pretend to give a complete account of all the events that took place, nor even to deal exhaustively with the phenomena that concern them most. Historical records of past ages have largely perished because of the wars, vandalism, and neglect that they have suffered. Many statements of the Scriptures cannot be corroborated because they have hitherto remained the sole witness to the facts of which they speak, but they need not consequently be regarded with suspicion. As new discoveries enlarge the knowledge of the ancient world, they tend to confirm rather than contradict the Bible. All interpretative hypotheses that are formed from known facts should be regarded as tentative until sufficient evidence is available to afford concrete confirmation.

Sometimes the critic rather than the evidence may be at fault. He may not have seen the evidence in its proper light, and so may have drawn hasty or false conclusions. Biblical language can be misunderstood because it is not in the idiom of our own times. Numerous minor misinterpretations of the New Testament have been cleared by the discovery of papyri which have not changed the readings of the manuscripts, but which have shown that a well-known word had been wrongly translated. Any previous critical judgment on the text, however learned, would have been erroneous in circumstances of this kind because of imperfect understanding on the part of the critic.

The critical student of the Scriptures should learn to discount his own prejudices when dealing with evidence. Complete objectivity is probably impossible, for even unconsciously human beings think in molds; but if the theologians of the past have failed to interpret the Scriptures correctly because of an “unscientific” bias, it is equally true that many critics of the present fail even more lamentably because of an anti-supernaturalistic bias. In cases where positive evidence is lacking, suspended judgment is imperative; and the benefit of the doubt should be given to the Bible’s claim for itself.

In forming any conclusion concerning the historicity and truthfulness of the Scriptures, we should always keep in mind the purpose for which they were written. The writers of the Bible did not include more than their purpose of writing demanded, nor did they explain contemporary phenomena for the benefit of scholars in the twentieth century A.D. To charge them with omission or obscurity is to presuppose an obligation that they would not have recognized. Their readers or hearers would have understood easily allusions that are obscure to us, and would have been able to fill in gaps by commonplace knowledge that is not now available.

Furthermore, one should assume that these writers were normally truthful. Apart from any question of inspiration, the authors of the Old and New Testaments were not impelled by a perverted ambition to victimize a gullible public. They were not making a point of producing religious fiction. Most of them were prophets and preachers who jeopardized their lives to proclaim what these manuscripts contain. They would not have wasted their efforts in trivia, nor would they have propagated untruth. Falsehood is not unknown in religious literature, but there is no reason for beginning biblical research with the assumption that the subject of study is untrustworthy.

LIMITATIONS OF POSITIVE CONTRIBUTION

The unfortunate connotation of biblical criticism which has brought it into disrepute is that it is characterized by destructive denial. Generally those who have employed it have been accused of constantly attempting to find discrepancies in the Bible, and to discredit its truth. To enumerate apparent inconsistencies or disagreements in the text may be a part of the total procedure of investigation, but to conclude on a basis of insufficient evidence that they indicate unreliability is quite another thing. The aim of a healthy criticism should be to seek fuller understanding and confirmation of the purpose of sincere writers and to clarify their obscurities, rather than to make these obscurities a reason for rejecting their testimony.

The above limitations do not circumscribe the scholar in his investigative work. He has the utmost liberty to search for evidence, classify and interpret it, view the Bible in its light, and formulate hypotheses of interpretation that may prove helpful. They do mean that he cannot honestly entertain a hostile bias to the Scriptures and at the same time do them justice, nor should he treat an hypothesis as fact when it has not sufficient material evidence to support it. He should be sure of his premises before speaking with finality.

As an illustration of the application of these limitations, one may cite the work of C. C. Thiele on The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings. For years the chronologies of the kings of Israel and Judah had defied reconciliation, and many scholars had concluded either that the biblical text was corrupt, or that it was historically untrustworthy. Thiele, operating on the principle that the record was truthful, though obscure, showed quite satisfactorily that it involved two methods of reckoning that changed without notice in the text. While he did not solve immediately all the problems of chronology, his simple explanation reconciled the conflicting figures and confirmed the existing account. Accepting the presupposition of essential truthfulness led to sounder conclusions.

The recognition of limitations is not a plea for obscurantism, but for more persistent research. Where the Bible seemingly disagrees with history, we need to probe deeper into the available evidence and be ready to rearrange our thinking, if necessary. Hypotheses may come and go; understanding may be imperfect; but truth is eternal, and is available to those who will pay the price for it.

Thy Word is a Mirror

I am that man who built more barns

To hold the grain he could not use.

I am the careless youth who sold

His birthright for a bowl of food.

I am the brother who, by ruse,

Stole blessing in a borrowed hide;

And, passing by on the other side,

The pious man who prayed too loud

To hear the groans beside the road.

I am the young fool who expended

His fortune in a foreign place;

And, staying at home with duty, was offended

To watch the prodigal’s return to grace.

Lost in the brambles of some rocky cleft,

Am I perhaps some one stray scabby sheep

For which the ninety-nine are left?

M. A. PRYOR

Samuel M. Shoemaker is the author of a number of popular books and the gifted Rector of Calvary Episcopal Church in Pittsburgh. He is known for his effective leadership of laymen and his deeply spiritual approach to all vital issues.

First in a Series

Has Europe’s “springtime in theology”—as contemporary dogmaticians sometimes fondly describe the Barth-Brunner era—now lapsed into “theological wintertime”?

A probing of the theological situation on the European mainland will soon reveal that a major shift in theological perspectives once again engulfs the doctrinal outlook of the Continent. It is increasingly evident that, despite their high intention, the “crisis theologians” have failed to rally twentieth century Protestant dogmatics firmly to the central message of apostolic Christianity, the biblical kerygma.

The current theological reaction is already in process. Will it dissolve completely neo-orthodoxy’s hard-won theological gains over speculative liberalism in the first decades of this century? Will a renaissance of liberal dogmatics, shaped mainly by the influence of Rudolf Bultmann, soon sweep European theology into a “Christian end-time”? Is Continental Protestanism to confront the hard-fisted naturalism of Communist ideology with merely a romanticized naturalism overgilded with a pretense of Christian faith?

Or can we yet hope for a sound evangelical revival, once again to plunge the roots of biblical theology, ethics, and evangelism deeply into the life and culture of lands wherein the light of the Protestant Reformation is now dimmed? Does the Continental turmoil in theological discussion supply a fresh opportunity for a strategic soundly biblical theological thrust? Or will Protestant orthodoxy—now seldom championed at the theological level and sparsely defended by influential clergymen—let the present season of realignment stiffen into a new era of liberal rationalism, and fail to plant and reap a contemporary harvest for biblical theology and evangelism?

BULTMANN KING FOR A DAY?

Without a doubt, theological convictions are again shifting in Europe. In recent weeks we spent a stimulating hour with Karl Barth in Basel and with Emil Brunner in Zürich. These “crisis-theologians” more than any others have influenced the neo-orthodox impact upon European theology in our time. Both dogmaticians—Barth at 74, Brunner at 71—are now completing the final volumes of their systematic theology.

There in Switzerland we spoke briefly of Continental theology in the recent past, spoke more fully of the outlook for the decade ahead. Barth and Brunner personally disagree on many points—from general revelation to eschatology. But in their evaluation of the present theological situation in German-speaking Europe, they are in substantial agreement. Today the theological initiative with divinity students lies no longer with the neo-supernaturalism of Barth, nor of Brunner; rather, the initiative has passed to the theological existentialism of Rudolf Bultmann. Today Bultmann is king. The retired Marburg professor of New Testament, now 76, has captured the imagination of many young intellectuals. Bultmann’s call to “demythologize” the Gospel—a call which Bultmann’s critics deplore as virtually destructive of the kerygma and as a battle cry for the renaissance of liberalism—has rallied many divinity students and younger ministers to his side.

“Today Bultmann is king,” Brunner concedes, although he adds the confident comment, “but not for long—because he thins out the Gospel too much.” And Barth, while reluctant to cast himself in the role of an aging prophet, thinks the theology of the immediate future may rest between Bultmann and Lutheran confessionalism.

Meanwhile, New Testament interpreters like Oscar Cullmann, aware of the threat to biblical faith inherent in Bultmann’s position, increasingly orient their theological discussions to the growing influence of the Marburg scholar’s speculations.

BEYOND THE GERMAN BORDERS

In the past, European theology has decisively influenced American and British theology—through graduate students on the Continent, many of whom returned from studies to their homelands to teaching posts, through translations of German works, and through lecture tours by Continental scholars. Even today, if one surveys the Scottish seminaries with an eye on the theologians, he will swiftly sense the lengthened shadows of German thought: Barth’s influence in Edinburgh, Brunner’s in Aberdeen, Bultmann’s in Glasgow, and Neo-Kantianism in St. Andrews. European theology has exerted world influence through its systematic comprehensive structure (contrasted with popular, topical and programmatic discussions that characterize most American scholars, and also ecumenical conferences) and through its determination to speak relevantly and definitively to the moving front of the cultural dilemma.

As early as 1951 Bultmann spent three months in the United States as guest lecturer in different universities and theological schools. English translations of some of his major writings appeared as early as 1934, simultaneously with the works of Barth and Brunner, as Anglo-Saxon interest widened over the struggle between the left and right wings of the neo-orthodox movement in Germany. Any shift of theological moorings from Barth to Bultmann, therefore, promises repercussions far beyond the borders of Germany.

Of the 26 per cent of the Protestant clergy in America who are nonconservative in theology (CHRISTIANITY TODAY’s survey indicates that 74 per cent of the ministers prefer to be classified as conservative or fundamentalist) 14 per cent range themselves as theologically liberal, and 12 per cent as theologically neo-orthodox. Despite the remarkable influence of Barth and Brunner on Continental theology, it is curious that Protestant liberals continue to outnumber neo-orthodox ministers in America by a slight margin. The “theology of crisis,” moreover, has produced no great American systematic exponent of its dogmatics (Reinhold Niebuhr’s literary efforts are concentrated mainly in anthropology and social ethics).

This circumstance has served to enlarge the influence of Paul Tillich, now often designated by the secular press as America’s leading theologian. Tillich’s philosophy of religion (as his Systematic Theology is more aptly described) is significantly identified with the revolt against the manner in which both Barth and Brunner appeal to special revelation, and also with the growing transition to Bultmann’s emphasis on decision and “new being.” Both Bultmann and Tillich analyze the human predicament in terms of modern existentialist philosophy. Both scholars make the modern scientific credo so decisive that the biblical miraculous is dissolved in deference to the closed system of nature. In Bultmann’s exposition whatever is supernatural is “demythologized.” No place remains for God’s supernatural activity in the creation, preservation, and redemption of the world—not even in transforming man into a new creation. The only remnant of the biblical tradition—if one may call it thus—is God’s address, his speaking, to the individual man. Tillich’s God is not a living Creator of man and the world, is not a personal, acting God of righteousness and grace, but simply the dimension of depth in every creature which “becomes personal” when man “rightly” relates himself to it.

If Bultmann still stresses God’s special encounter, God’s “saving” address to man in Jesus Christ (whereas the note of general revelation stands in the forefront of Tillich’s philosophy), Bultmann’s critics, and even some admirers, more and more take him to task precisely at this point. As Herman Ridderbos reminds us, there remains no room in a consistently developed desupernaturalized theology for the confrontation of man by the special action and word of God: “If one would apply radically Bultmann’s proposed de-mythologizing, what basis remains for conceiving the Christian proclamation (kerygma) as a Word of God intervening in this world?… Bultmann at least at this point breaks with his own schema …” (Herman Ridderbos, Bultmann, p. 37. International Library of Philosophy and Theology, “Modern Thinker Series,” 1960). Similarly, Schubert M. Ogden, in his introduction to his selection and translation of shorter writings of Bultmann just issued under the title of Existence and Faith, asks whether, on their own presuppositions, the divine-human encounter postulated by the existentialist and dialectical theologians can be actualized “only through Jesus Christ” (pp. 20 f.; 299, n. 3). Other scholars, like John Macquarrie (himself quite enamoured of Bultmann’s rejection of the bodily resurrection of Christ, but troubled by the exclusion of all supernaturalism from the life of Jesus Christ) ask: If the Redeemer-image is wholy mythical, what compulsion remains for sacrificially espousing his cause, the Cross?

THE CONTROLLING PREMISE

Nonetheless, contemporary European theology is still bound together by its underlying and controlling premise: the infinite qualitative difference between God and the creature. This premise is then delineated to mean much more than the sovereignty of God and the finitude of man, which is part and parcel of the Christian view of God and the world. Rather, it serves to endorse a specific and highly debatable notion of divine revelation. This “infinite qualitive difference” between God and man is said to allow only a dialectical relationship between the eternal and the temporal: 1. God’s revelation is never objectively given in concepts, words, or historical events; he reveals himself (not truths about himself and his purpose) by encountering man subjectively. 2. God cannot be grasped rationally but can be experienced only in obedient response. Before Barth and Brunner popularized the “theology of crisis,” Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) had shaped the speculative outlines of this view by his delineation of the infinite, qualitative difference between eternity and time.

Despite the struggle between Barthianism and Bultmannism today, this dialectical restatement of special revelation remains the undisputed premise of contemporary European theology. Not only have many German theologians and ministers “learned to live happily” with this exposition, as one is often reminded by champions of the dialectical view, but the historic evangelical theology which insisted on divinely revealed doctrines and on an inspired Bible is premised—so it is now said—on an assumption about God’s relationship with man that destroys the very actuality of revelation.

The post-Barthian era in German theology, therefore, does not question the legitimacy of the dialectical reconstruction of prophetic-apostolic revelation. The post-modern dialectical premise remains theologically determinative. Bultmann, no less than Barth and Brunner, sets out with this same presupposition.

But it is against this premise that a genuinely evangelical, or Bible-bound, theology directs its criticism. In fact, evangelical orthodoxy raises three important questions:

1. Does the instability of the neo-orthodox theology of Barth and Brunner flow from an unsuccessful attempt to force central elements of the Christian revelation into the speculative dialectical mold?

2. Does not Bultmann develop the dialectical premise more thoroughly than Barth and Brunner, Bultmann’s reaction being provoked in part by the ambiguous manner in which Barth and Brunner themselves relate faith to reason, to science, and to history?

3. Does the dialectical exposition of the character of revelation really conform to the witness of the Bible, or is it rather a speculative conception to which aspects of Christian theology and experience are arbitrarily and unjustifiably appended?

Samuel M. Shoemaker is the author of a number of popular books and the gifted Rector of Calvary Episcopal Church in Pittsburgh. He is known for his effective leadership of laymen and his deeply spiritual approach to all vital issues.

When we think of missions, we usually think of the great movement of the Church from West to East as she proclaims the Gospel of Christ. We are forcefully reminded, however, that there is a movement today from East to West, a missionary movement of important consequence. I have in mind the missionary activity of Mohammedanism.

The Ahmadiyyah Moslem Mission, located in the Hague, issues a journal called The Review of Religions. The March, 1960, issue of this magazine featured an article bearing the title, “The Salvation of Europe.” I will give the following brief summary of this article:

The writer begins with the observation that Islam was on the defensive in the nineteenth century, a century that saw the glorious history of Islam at its lowest point. During this time, the West with its destructive powers, its materialistic philosophy, and its aggressive Church was without contention master of the field. But today we are witnessing a marvelous revival. The miracle is taking place. The West has lost its grip on the East. Islam is no longer on the defensive, but has taken to the offensive. The Church lost a powerful ally when the Tzar of Russia fell before the Russian Revolution, and now she stands threatened by the Kremlin. The West may be trying to overcome this threat by way of technical development, diplomacy, and assistance to underdeveloped territories. The Church may be working at missions as never before. But in fact, the West is on the wane and the Church is helpless against the tide of communism.

The writer goes on to say that the idea of a God who committed suicide on a cross to save mankind can offer no help. Nor can the West restore its position now that the East and Near-East have escaped from under its foot. Salvation lies in Islam alone. “The promised Messiah predicted that a series of terrible events should occur in the West, leading to a change of thought in the Continent of Europe, which change will benefit Islam.” From this arises the new calling for Islam towards the West. The Moslem world is financially able to carry on its mission. Moslem leaders are in ruling places from Indonesia to Morocco. There is only one hindrance: Islam is still too defensive, it must go all out on the offense. This is the time to let the light shine over Europe and America. “This is a divine decree and therefore must be so.” This article ends: “May God bless those who listen and obey.”

The mission of Islam is only beginning. The first Mosque in this country was built in the Hague in 1955. The activity stems primarily from the movement which I have mentioned. It also speaks of cooperating with others toward a better understanding between Islam and Christianity. But as one reads the missionary appeal of Islam and notes how the faith of Christianity is grotesquely caricatured, he is more impressed with the offensive against Christianity than with any attempt to understand it. The movement wishes first of all to save the West by freeing the West of Christianity. It says that this liberation will occur through divine guidance, spiritual rebirth, and prayer. Europe and America, in any case, are primary objects of the Islam missionary movement.

The West is the goal because the West is spiritually poor. As we observe this movement, we would be ill-advised to spurn it from pride. We have also little reason to smile. There is only one right response to Islam’s new missionary vision. It must be seen in terms of challenge. The important question that it poses is this: does the Church understand that her own calling in Jesus Christ is missions? Is the movement of the Church outward from her own self-conscious existence as a saved community to the darkness, the very darkness from which she was first saved?

The missionary movement of the Church has not always been seen as essential. It has sometimes been thought in history that the Church could be a church and stand still. But the apostles would have thought it impossible to conceive of the Church in any other way than on the move to the outermost parts of the world. A church self-satisfied in her own ecclesiastical cubicle would not have been a church at all in the eyes of the apostles.

Toynbee has written well of the significance of the “challenge” to civilizations. If a civilization accepts the chalenge facing it, it can grow to new power and position. This gives the Church a hint. Does she take the hint of the challenge offered by the missionary activity of the East? Does she understand her calling in the world of today? The events of our day can be apocalyptic events that call the Church to her task, and a consciousness of her calling.

It is clear from the New Testament that missions is not a chapter in the history of the Church, from which she can pass on to other matters. Missions is an eschatological sign of the coming of the Kingdom. The Church’s concern for the world must be her distinguishing feature. The Church is not allowed the luxury of introversion. She is compelled to go out into the world. This does not mean that the Church may lose concern for her own health. Rather, it means that the proclamation of salvation in Jesus Christ is elemental for the Church’s good health. We may for a moment be impressed by the revitalized missionary spirit of Islam. But we must then directly be summoned to deeper self-examination of our own lives and to eager readiness to dig in and work while it is yet day, and look as we do to the coming of the Kingdom.

Challenge To The Wellhausen Theory

The Religion of Israel: from Its Beginnings to the Babylonian Exile, by Yehezkel Kaufmann, trans. by Moshe Greenberg (University of Chicago, 1959, 486 pp., $7.50), reviewed by Oswald T. Allis, formerly member of Old Testament Department, Princeton Theological Seminary.

This is a provocative and also provoking book by a distinguished Jewish scholar, who was until recently Professor of Bible in the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. It is an abridgment of a seven-volume work written in Hebrew and published in Tel-Aviv over a period of years (1937–1946). The book makes interesting and stimulating reading. It is the work of a decidedly independent thinker and the reader will pay tribute to the wide learning of the author.

Like his compatriot Benno Jacobs, Kaufmann writes as a critic of the still widely held Wellhausen hypothesis. But while Jacobs and more recently Wouk emphatically reject, as did Dornseiff, the documentary analysis of the Pentateuch, Kaufman regards it as one of the achievements of criticism which may be regarded as firmly established. He holds also that the “Torah book” (Pentateuch and Former Prophets) “was not in pre-exilic times canonical and binding on the nation,” that Deuteronomy “was promulgated in the reign of Josiah,” and that “the Torah as a whole was promulgated and fixed in the time of Ezra-Nehemiah.” On the other hand he holds that the order of the Pentateuchal documents is JE,P,D and not JE,D,P. He insists that P knows nothing of D and must therefore be earlier. He also claims that the Law precedes the Prophets, or to be more exact that they represent two more or less parallel developments, which grew up independently. He is strongly opposed to the Scandinavian (Uppsala) school and says of it: “The religio-historical views of this school are even more paganistic than those of the classical criticism.” The same, he tells us, “may be said of the British school of Hooke and his adherents.” Thus it appears that this book is a challenge to the critics by a fellow critic who is fully worthy of their steel. It is safe to predict that the challenge will not be unanswered.

The conservative reader, on the other hand, will find the book decidedly provoking for the reason that Kaufmann’s attitude toward the authority of Scripture does not differ materially from that of the scholars whose views he criticizes and rejects. Two examples must suffice. Kaufmann does justice to the evidence from archaeology as to the antiquity of writing. He tells us that the great writing prophets wrote down their utterances themselves. This is good news in view of the emphasis placed by so many critics today on oral tradition and many revisings and editings of the prophetical books. But why does Kaufmann think we have the “autographs” of the prophets? His reason is that the prophets made mistakes, that some of their predictions were unfulfilled or falsified by history; and in the fact that these predictions appear in the text he finds the proof that the followers of the prophets reverenced them so highly that they did not venture to edit or delete. Hence the prophetical books may be regarded as authentic. A bad argument in support of a good position! Kaufmann insists that the prophets “misunderstood” the idolatry of the pagan peoples, and by failing to recognize its mythology they treated it as fetishism. We prefer to believe that these prophets who knew the “abominations” of the heathen at first hand and were engaged in constant conflict with them, were better acquainted with the inwardness of these cults than are the modern students of comparative religion who study them at a distance.

OSWALD T. ALLIS

Biblical Insights

The Bible Today, by C. H. Dodd (Cambridge, 1960, 168 pp., $1.45), is reviewed by William Childs Robinson, Professor of Historical Theology, Columbia Theological Seminary.

As a study of the Bible by a scholar of Dodd’s stature, this work has many excellent insights. There is continuity in the worshiping community, unity between the Old and the New Testaments in that one is promise and the other fulfillment, and the law is ably treated. The early Christian movement is seen as a generation of expansion followed by one of conflict and then of consolidation.

Yet one must demur from the Old Testament higher critical positions which are assumed. For example, we are told that the five centuries following the sixth (B.C.) were a period of great literary activity during which the bulk of the books of the Old Testament took shape … and yet “of the events of the period the literature has little to say” (p. 58). Can Dr. Dodd offer a parallel for this strange phenomenon anywhere else?

On the contrary, he recognizes that the New Testament was about a century in being written, and that the great epistles were written in the most active part of Paul’s career.

We heartily concur with the distinguished author that the Gospel of Christ and the Law of Christ are both fundamental in the gospels and the epistles, and both have meaning only as they are referred to the historical personality and work of Jesus Christ.

WILLIAM CHILDS ROBINSON

Edwardsian Evangelism

Steps to Salvation: The Evangelistic Message of Jonathan Edwards, by John H. Gerstner (Westminster, 1960, 192 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by G. Aiken Taylor, Editor, The Presbyterian Journal.

The Professor of Church History and Government at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary presents a systematic analysis of how America’s greatest philosophical theologian, Jonathan Edwards, viewed the conversion experience and the steps leading to it.

Gerstner calls Edwards’ theology (“Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”) “scare theology.” He justifies this interpretation in these words: “(For Edwards) hell is about all of spiritual reality that can affect an unconverted man.”

The book is based on the New Englander’s sermon manuscripts and probably should be classified as an interpretation rather than an exposition. Edwards himself never systematized the steps in conversion. Dr. Gerstner has taken advantage of this fact in order to present to his readers the noted Puritan theologian’s thoughts in a manner more easily grasped.

Most suggestive for a day in which Predestination has been under heavy attack is the way Dr. Gerstner relates Edwards’ high Calvinism to his evangelistic zeal. Actually this is the theme of the entire book.

“Predestination preachers have usually been evangelistic preachers,” the author points out. As Edwards insisted, the fixity of the divine decrees in no way altered the responsibility of men.

The reasoning is relatively simple in its profundity. God, who is absolutely sovereign, is gracious in his sovereignty. The greatest sinner among men may be saved if God pleases. And men will be saved when they come to recognize, in an awareness of their awful need, that God alone can save them, if he pleases. When men seek the Lord, it is a sign that he pleases. Men are therefore encouraged to seek him. The call to decision is efficacious because it is the call of God to begin with: his Word, in the mouth of his servant.

Here is hard doctrine, but spirit-satisfying strong meat.

G. AIKEN TAYLOR

Wooden Jesus

The Last Temptation of Christ, by Nikos Kazantzakis, translated from the Greek by P. A. Bien (Simon and Schuster, 1960, 506 pp., $6), is reviewed by Sherwood E. Wirt, Editor of Decision.

In a closing “note on the author and his use of language,” the translator of this novel tells that the late author, a Greek writer who missed the Nobel prize for literature by one vote, wished “to lift Christ out of the Church altogether.” His purpose, it seems, was “to fashion a new saviour and thereby rescue himself from a moral and spiritual void.” He “wished to make Jesus a figure for a new age, while still retaining everything in the Christ-legend” that seemed valuable.

The result is a Jesus who is curiously wooden; who is a target for the emotional catapults of men and angels alike; who takes issue with Paul of Tarsus over the latter’s Christological orthodoxy; and who is essentially the struggling hero of a (modern) Greek tragedy. Like so many before him, Kazantzakis writes the story of his own stormy life and clothes it in the garment of the Nazarene.

SHERWOOD E. WIRT

Playing Yogi

Christian Yoga, by J. M. Dechanet (Harper, 1960, 196 pp., $3.75), is reviewed by Georges A. Barrois, Professor of the History and Theology of the Medieval Church, Princeton Theological Seminary.

We like to believe that the author has successfully disentangled his Yoga from the Hindu religious ideology with which Yoga is normally associated. Then nothing more would remain than a harmless, and perhaps beneficial, gymnastic. Everybody knows that bodily attitudes may influence mental, and eventually spiritual, activities; each religious group has its proven devotional gestures. But why should Yoga be the thing? We do not read that Jesus, who as a man was closer to his Father than any one of us can possibly be, ever practiced the “tree,” or the “bent bow,” or the “dolphin,” nor did his disciples. The following declaration, a rather unusual one, is printed back of the title page: “It is not implied that those who have granted the Nihil obstat and Imprimatur agree with the contents, opinions or statements expressed.” Obviously they have little use for Yoga; or do they anticipate unfavorable reactions from Rome? The author is the Prior of a Benedictine monastery in the Congo—of all places! Man, wake up! Africa is afire, while you are playing Yogi. Is this what you have been ordained for?

GEORGES A. BARROIS

Baptist Preaching

Southern Baptist Preaching, edited by H. C. Brown, Jr. (Broadman, 1959, 227 pp., $4), is reviewed by Andrew W. Blackwood, Professor Emeritus, Princeton Theological Seminary.

This book shows contemporary Southern Baptist preaching at its ablest. Each of 22 ministers submits a brief life sketch, a statement on “How I Prepare My Sermons,” and a favorite message.

The sermons are biblical in substance, evangelical in doctrine, practical in outlook, clear and interesting in style, and widely varied. Among the preachers are Theodore F. Adams, T. T. Crabtree, Billy Graham, G. Earl Quinn, Herschel H. Hobbs, C. Oscar Johnson, Robert G. Lee, Duke K. McCall, Caryle Marney, Charles A. Trentham, Perry F. Webb, and J. Howard Williams.

The compiler has done his work well. His book ranks among the best of its kind.

ANDREW W. BLACKWOOD

Pastor’S Guide

The Minister in Christian Education, by Peter P. Person (Baker, 1960, 134 pp., $2.95), is reviewed by James DeForest Murch.

Pastors who are, or ought to be, active in the Christian Education program of the local church will find this an invaluable practical volume. It tells how pastors can enlarge their usefulness in their teaching ministry; deals with their part in the Sunday school, the vacation school, the week-day school, youth and adult programs, leadership recruitment—in fact, every phase of education at the local church level. Dr. Person, author of the widely used textbook Introduction to Christian Education, writes out of a long and rich experience in his field.

JAMES DEFOREST MURCH

Luther Gold

Luther and Culture, by George W. Forell, Harold J. Grimm, and Theo. Hoelty-Nickel (Luther College Press, 1960, 211 pp., $3), is reviewed by Victor E. Beck, Secretary of Literature and Book Editor, Augustana Book Concern.

Luther has become a veritable mine for prospectors. In this volume George W. Forell of Chicago Lutheran Theological Seminary, Harold J. Grimm of The Ohio State University, and Theo. Hoelty-Nickel of Valparaiso University, scholars in their field, have quarried respectively in the ores, Luther and Politics, Luther and Education, Luther and Music. How accurately and adequately they have brought forth the “pure gold” perhaps only Luther himself, whose “mind was never static” (page 147), could say.

But here is an addition to the growing Luther material which those interested in Luther will want. A good index would have added to the usefulness of the book, but ample fly leaves at the end provided the reviewer with space to make one of his own.

VICTOR E. BECK

Shaky Foundation

The Word Incarnate, by W. Norman Pittenger (Harper, 1959, 295 pp., $7.50), is reviewed by Edward John Carnell, Professor of Ethics and Philosophy of Religion, Fuller Theological Seminary.

This is an erudite, yet highly readable, study of the person of Christ. The author defends a position which lies somewhere between traditional orthodoxy and the mediating schools of liberalism, though it is not easy to tell just where this position is. The author forthrightly rejects the liberal distinction between the “Jesus of history” and the “Christ of faith,” yet he rests his Christology on a view of Scripture which is much closer to liberalism than it is to orthodoxy. He places more reliance on the faith of the responding community than on the original charismatic gifts enjoyed by the apostolic college. The redemptive events of Christ’s life, death, and resurrection are stressed. But the stories of the nativity, of the empty tomb, and of the ascension and Pentecost are dismissed as “legends.” I regard this as a very shaky foundation on which to raise a rigorous, thoroughly biblical study of the person of Christ.

Nonetheless, this is a book to be reckoned with. It sets forth a painstaking introduction to contemporary viewpoints in Christology. The author is at home in most of the primary sources, ancient and modern, and he goes out of his way to provide the reader with such illuminating helps as learned footnotes, extensive bibliographies, and select quotations. His care and scholarship might well serve as a model for younger students in systematic theology. A book of this stature deserves a wide hearing, but its dreadfully high price may frustrate such a possibility.

EDWARD JOHN CARNELL

Liberal Journey

A Journey through the Old Testament, by M. A. Beek, trans. by Arnold J. Pomerans (Harper, 1959, 244 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by K. M. Yates, Jr., Associate Professor of Old Testament and Archaeology, Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary.

The author of this work is a Dutch scholar who teaches at the University of Amsterdam. Although he is not well known in English-speaking countries, his ability has been recognized for some time on the continent. The presence of this translation of one of his works serves as an introduction to one who will be heard more in the coming years.

There is, throughout the book, evidence of great enthusiasm coupled with thorough scholarship. The author has a style of writing which keeps “the journey” continually moving. His power of description and his vivid manner of presenting facts sustain the reader’s interest in a remarkable way.

The book is not designed as a study of the entire Old Testament. Professor Beek has been very selective in choosing what he considers most important or most interesting connection with each period of Israel’s history. The 73 brief chapters are the outgrowth of a series of radio broadcast talks, and are designed for laymen who have not a comprehensive knowledge of the contents of the Old Testament.

Although the book is not planned as a treatment of critical questions, the author’s own position is evident. Having been trained in the school of Albrecht Alt, his views on the historicity of the events connected with Moses and the Exodus are similar to those of Martin Noth. Although cognizant of certain archaeological discoveries, he ignores the numerous finds which give historical background to this important phase of Israel’s beginnings. Beek says of Moses, “He became a myth and so the real truth about his life will never be known.” This view is applied to the recorded events from Joseph to the conquest in Canaan.

The author’s more liberal position is also illustrated by his view of the value of the creation narrative in Genesis: for example, “Not that I wish to claim Genesis 1 is inherently greater than the myths of older peoples and religions.” However, in keeping with the emphasis of the school of Alt, a great change in attitude toward Old Testament history occurs from the beginning of the United Kingdom. From this point onward, the author ignores or de-emphasizes the critical problems involved.

There are many unique aspects of interpretative value in the work. The author’s enthusiastic style and love for the Old Testament bring to light many pathways seldom explored by the average student of the Bible. Once the critical position of the author is recognized and understood, the book becomes valuable to one in exploring various facets along the journey through the Old Testament.

K. M. YATES, JR.

Ready-Mixed Sermons

Religion That Is Eternal, by G. Ray Jordan (Macmillan, 1960, 134 pp., $3), is reviewed by C. Philip Hinerman, Pastor of Park Avenue Methodist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

This book is for the preacher who is feverishly looking for a sermon to be used next Sunday morning. It is, in point of fact, a combination book of sermon outlines and excellent illustrations, nearly all of them bright and shiny, and some of them new. Author G. Ray Jordan is a former Southern Methodist pastor and is now homiletics professor at Chandler School of Theology, Emory University, Atlanta. Dr. Jordan wrote an earlier book for young ministers titled You Can Preach! With this latest book the professor seems determined to prove it, even to the point of giving us the message to use. No one any longer need say that he cannot preach. The ready-mix is right in the package.

These sermons are far from being great existentialistic preaching, but they do possess a do-it-yourself quality ideal for the desperate parson. A complete outline for the sermon was thoughtfully added at the end of each message to further simplify the preparation.

C. PHILIP HINERMAN

Light On Beatitudes

The Cross on the Mountain, by Sherwood Eliot Wirt (Crowell, 1959, 129 pp., $2.75), is reviewed by John K. Mickelsen, Pastor of Canoga Presbyterian Church, Seneca Falls, New York.

“The Beatitudes in the Light of the Cross,” the subtitle given on the paper jacket, describes the subject and approach of the book. Dr. Wirt lets the Cross, the death and resurrection of our Lord, shed its penetrating light on the Beatitudes. In his exposition, the eight piercing declarations of our Redeemer bring us to his Cross. We learn to rest upon him, accept our crucifixion with him, and live obediently in the power of his resurrection.

The sixth meditation on “the pure in heart” is entitled “The Washing of the Cup.” Here is a sample of the spiritual food which the chapter offers. “In eleven short words Jesus now faces us with man’s highest hope and his deepest frustration.… We need major cardiac surgery of the kind that the Lord prescribed for Israel: ‘A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you’ ” (pp. 78–81). “The only conscious thing we can say about the pure in heart is that they are fundamentally honest about their own impurity.… They have carried motivation research to the point where they know that since the ‘heart is deceitful above all things’ (Jer. 17:9), the good life must be a gift of Grace, and their good works are but the works of the Lord” (pp. 81–84). “The instant that the Christian life ceases to be a pilgrimage of sacred events and becomes a consuming fire, the celestial vision is ours, though there is nothing left of us but ashes” (pp. 91–94).

JOHN K. MICKELSEN

Roman Romance

The Bride of Pilate by Esther Kellner (Appleton, 1959, 305 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by Marie Malmin Meyer, Professor of English, St. Olaf College.

The historical novel ranks second only to the detective story as escape literature. And therefore the reading public will welcome Esther Kellner’s most recent novel, The Bride of Pilate. In choosing her subject, Miss Kellner has recognized that the author of a historical novel gains greatest artistic freedom by dealing with a little known character out of history or by inventing persons whose experiences will typify a historical situation. She chose the wife of Pilate as her main character, for about her we know nothing except that she warned Pilate against condemning Jesus. Thus with a complete freedom, she has produced a story purely imaginative up to the last 50 pages, where then the characters are linked to the story of Jesus, “the Native,” as he is called in the novel.

Unfortunately, the linking is highly artificial and contrived. That Pilate’s wife was an unacknowledged granddaughter of Emperor Augustus of Rome one might willingly accept, and even that the Roman centurion whose child Jesus healed miraculously was a close friend of hers, in fact the son of her foster parents in Rome, one might admit; but that the thief whom Jesus saved on the cross was a part of her earlier life—first as the pirate through whose activities she was at the age of 13 returned from exile to Rome, and then as the man she really loved—overstrains one’s sense of credulity.

Yet the book is delightful to read. The narrative moves rapidly, and Miss Kellner shows a sensitive feeling for Roman and Hebrew custom and tradition. The character of Claudia is well drawn, as is also that of Lucius Pontius Pilate.

I am not sure that this novel qualifies as Biblical-historical fiction, but as historical romance of the Roman era, it is a pleasantly entertaining piece of work.

MARIE MALMIN MEYER

Catholic Reading

Harvest 1960, edited by Dan Herr and Paul Cuneo (Newman Press, 1960, 290 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by Stuart P. Garver, Director of Christ’s Mission, New York.

A former editor of The Commonweal observed that “no group has taken fuller advantage of freedom of the press than American Catholics.” This is true, but it is also terribly frustrating for a reading public already floundering in the vast ocean of ink created by American writers. Who can find time to scan—let alone assimilate—the best any group of authors might produce? The anthologies, the condensed books, the choice readings edited by professors and enterprising publishers at least help us to keep informed about the minds and motives of our contemporaries. While one may not applaud the selection of materials for these compilations, he will, nevertheless, be appreciative of the work that has gone into their preparation.

Harvest 1960 represents what Messrs. Herr and Cuneo considered to be the best articles appearing in 22 Roman Catholic publications in America. Their selection of authors and subjects is itself laudable and, whether one agrees or disagrees with what has been written, he cannot escape the fact that Roman Catholic writers as herein represented deserve to be read with due respect for both their spirit and literary style.

This is not a polemic against Protestants so much as an open window through which one can hear the Roman Catholic literary elite discussing the problems of their church. Indeed the book has nothing else to tie it together except a common loyalty to the Roman Catholic “position” within the framework of American democracy. The papal church no longer strives for recognition as an integral part of the New World culture but has become very self-conscious as a social and political power in a democratic, pluralistic society.

There is certainly nothing juvenile in these chapters, although one sometimes feels certain attitudes expressed are more adolescent than adult. From the Protestant viewpoint there is the obvious influence of an official magisterium which few care to challenge. The priest is everywhere present and yet, with but very few exceptions, one looks in vain for any essay on the complex problems which confront American Catholics in their relationship with Protestants and other non-Catholics.

Of special interest in this presidential election year are the contributions of Senator Eugene McCarthy, John Cogley, Charles Malik. The editors of The Pilot have questions they would ask a Protestant nominee for the office of President, and a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee shares in a panel discussion, “How to Get into the Political Act.”

Perhaps no other paragraph in all the book displays the new spirit of Roman Catholicism in America better than the following lines written by the English lawyer, Norman St. John-Stevas:

“The responsibility of the Catholic Church to the American nation is a heavy one. As the doctrinal basis of Protestantism dissolves, the moral cosmos fragments with it, and the time is not far distant when the Catholic Church will become the sole institutional repository of Christian values in the United States.”

STUART P. GARVER

Book Briefs

Techniques of Christian Writing, by Benjamin P. Browne (Judson, 1960, 382 pp., $5). Forty practicing writers and editors give good advice to amateurs.

Awake, My Heart, by J. Sidlow Baxter (Zondervan, 1960, 384 pp., $3.95). Daily devotional studies by a noted British exegete.

Invitation toBible Study, by Miles Woodward Smith (National, 1960, 214 pp., $3.95). Simple aids for the lay student of the Scriptures, including an abridged concordance.

The Borderland, by Roger Lloyd (Macmillan, 1960, 111 pp., $2.50). A short explanation of the relationship of Christian theology and English literature.

Christianity in Art, by Frank and Dorothy Getlein (Bruce, 1959, 196 pp., $4.50). Valuable interpretations of Christian art in a Roman Catholic frame of reference.

Here’s How to Succeed With Your Money, by George H. Bowman (Moody, 1960, 191 pp., $3). Christian rules for financial success.

Laughter in the Bible, by Gary Webster (Bethany, 1960, 160 pp., $2.95). A captivating, fresh excursion into a subject mentioned 250 times in Sacred Writ.

Our Heavenly Father, by Helmut Thielicke (Harper, 1960, 157 pp., $3). Gripping sermons on the Lord’s Prayer preached in Germany during the horrific closing days of World War II.

The Sage of Bethany—A Pioneer in Broadcloth, compiled by Perry E. Gresham (Bethany, 1960, 189 pp., $1.95, paper). Competent critics evaluate the pioneer leadership of Alexander Campbell (1788–1866) in education, Christian unity, politics and social action.

The Self in Pilgrimage, by Dr. Earl A. Loomis, Jr. (Harper, 1960, 109 pp., $3). A distinguished psychiatrist shows how to lose self in communion with God and man.

View from the Ninth Decade, by J. C. Penney (Thomas Nelson, 1960, 222 pp., $3.50). Sage advice on principles of business success by a dedicated Christian merchant prince.

A few days ago the Honorable Robert Newbigin arrived in Port-au-Prince as the new U. S. ambassador to Haiti. A Protestant, he succeeds Gerald Drew, a Roman Catholic. The 55-year-old Newbigin, formerly U. S. ambassador to Honduras, is known to face a tough assignment. Haiti, the Caribbean republic that shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, is caught in the cross-streams of political floods in Latin America.

The religious scene in Haiti is characterized by a large evangelical advance in recent years, the expiration of a 100-year-old concordat with the Vatican, the coming respectability of voodoo, an influx of Communist literature in recent months, and a severe economic crisis.

Catholicism was introduced on Hispaniola to the Arawakan Indians following discovery by Columbus in 1492. In 1555 African slave-trade began at the instigation of a Catholic priest concerned about the high death rate among Indian slaves. Catholic teaching was forced upon the Negro slaves, who formed an amalgamation of Catholicism and a form of African paganism now known as voo-dooism. Today the official language of Haiti is French and the national language Creole.

Haiti won national independence from France and liberty from slavery in 1804. Not long after the republic was established the president, Petion, sent to Great Britain a request for Protestant missionaries. Two Methodists responded in 1816, worked for two years and made some converts, but were forced to leave when an unfriendly president was installed in 1818. The work was continued by the Haitian believers.

The first resident missionaries established in Haiti were British Methodists, in 1836. Some converts were won, but development was very slow. James T. Holly, a Negro Protestant Episcopal clergyman, came to Haiti in 1861. This field today is one of the Episcopal Church’s largest missionary dioceses with congregations in both rural and urban centers for some 13,000 communicants and a strong national clergy.

Baptist missions were introduced about 1895 by Eli Marc, a Frenchman who had studied in a Baptist seminary in the United States. He never left Haiti and worked nearly 50 years in the northeast sector. Upon his death his work went to the American Baptist Home Mission Society. One of his sons, Reuben Marc, is the pastor of the largest Baptist church in Haiti, which is located in Port-au-Prince and which claims some 2,500 members.

Pentecostals came to Haiti about 1930 and now have a large work numbering more than 20,000 believers.

The West Indies Mission, which entered in 1936, has developed an indigenous church on the southern peninsula with a Christian community of 63,000. Associated with the West Indies Mission are some 200 organized churches with 250 mission churches and some 150 national pastors and preachers. The West Indies Mission at Cayes has a Bible institute, printing plant, dispensary, and radio station.

The Church of God (Tennessee) sent their first missionaries in 1937.

In 1940 the Unevangelized Fields Mission established a work in the northwest. Today there are some 200 UFM congregations and Sunday Schools. They are engaged in training a national ministry at their Bible institute in Port-au-Prince. Orphanages, a hospital, high school, book store and Gospel press gives UFM a well-rounded missionary program.

The East and West Indies Bible Mission, which began in 1940, has been succeeded by the Oriental Missionary Society. One branch of its ministry is a radio station at Cape Haitian, which broadcasts not only in the languages of Haiti, but by short wave has an international ministry.

Today the predominant religion in Haiti is Roman Catholicism, with a clergy largely French and Canadian. The Roman church is faced not only with the dynamic and indigenous evangelical witness, but also with a growing feeling against a foreign clergy. Last year two French priests were expelled from the country by the government, accused of plotting against the government; the archbishop was placed under house arrest by the president of the republic.

After 100 years the concordat between Haiti and the Vatican expired last spring and the government of President François Duvalier has made no effort to renew it. Officially, the whole issue has been treated with silence. Meanwhile, Protestant groups petitioned for a denunciation. Some Catholics also are opposed to a renewal, asserting that by the concordat forces of colonialism have subsisted and Haiti continues under the domination of a colonial clergy. Some are known to resent that the government was required to support a seminary in France from which they have received such small dividends.

The Catholic church is deeply concerned by the advance of evangelicals in education. Methodists, American Baptists, Protestant Episcopals, and the Unevangelized Fields Mission have established high schools. Almost all missions have established Bible and theological schools for training national pastors and evangelists. The West Indies Mission is establishing Christian day schools in the southern peninsula together with a scholarship and normal school program for the preparation of accredited teachers. Evangelical radio stations of the West Indies Mission at Cayes and the Oriental Missionary Society at Cape Haitian are making a profound impression on the total population of Haiti. They are not only an effective means of evangelism but are creating a good climate for evangelism in every segment of Haitian society. The West Indies Mission plans to expand its radio ministry to cover the entire country with a network of four 1,000-watt stations. Their first station at Cayes has been on the air for two years. This month they are establishing a booster station at Jérémie and hope to have another booster on the air in Portau-Prince, the capital, by 1961. The Unevangelized Fields Mission has daily broadcasts on a commercial station at Port-au-Prince. After the West Indies Mission established their radio station, Catholics announced their intention to build a station but no particulars have been disclosed. A television station has been established and has offered evangelicals free time but no evangelical group is known to have taken advantage of the opportunity.

Haiti’s basic economic problem is unemployment. Well-educated young people cannot find jobs. As a result, they are social misfits. Spiritually, they seek a center around which to integrate their lives. Communism seeks to fill the vacuum with a great influx of literature in recent months. Some young people have turned to the nihilism of existential philosophy. It is also among these that the Jehovah’s Witnesses and other cults are making their greatest inroads. Jehovah’s Witnesses have more than 40 foreign missionaries in Haiti, many of whom are American negroes.

President Duvalier has seemingly gone all out to combat the multiple problems of poverty, unemployment, poor communications and illiteracy. He has been handicapped by an empty treasury. In a major speech this past summer he intimated that the ideology of Haiti was that of the West, but if the West did not give the proper kind of aid Haiti would have to look elsewhere. Haiti is not unaffected by the political influences of their closest neighbors, Cuba and the Dominican Republic. While anti-American feeling is definitely growing, the attitude of the people as a whole is wait-and-see. While missions in Haiti avoid involving themselves directly in politics, the political climate particularly as it touches on its attitudes the United States, the home of most of the missionaries, has a real bearing on evangelical missions.

Back in the Garden

Evangelist Billy Graham paid a return visit to Madison Square Garden last month. Despite the specialized nature of the week-end effort in seeking to reach only the Spanish-speaking population, Graham’s crowds matched those of his four-month campaign in the Garden in 1957. An aggregate of 43,500 attended the three services, with some 1,000 of these stepping forward to profess faith in Christ.

More than 10,000 Disciples of Christ trekked to Louisville, Kentucky, for the 1960 assembly of the International Convention of Christian Churches, October 21–26. It was the largest assembly in many years and one of the most significant in Disciples’ history. Actions taken may hate wide repercussions in the life of the nation’s largest religious body with distinctively American origins.

The convention theme, “His Mission—Our Decision,” was relevant to its “Decade of Decision” program, adopted by the 1959 convention. At the opening session in Kentucky’s mammoth Exposition Center, Convention President Loren E. Lair stated that the program’s purpose was to implement the mission of Christ in the world. Among specific advances which Lair proposed in the ten-year period were the establishment of 1,500 new churches and the raising of $400,000,000 for the work of the brotherhood at home and overseas.

The varied program of the convention also included major addresses by A. Dale Fiers, president of the United Christian Missionary Society; Albert Edward Day, noted Methodist divine: Marion Royce of Ontario’s Department of Labor; James H. Robinson, director of the Morningside Community Center in New York City; and Henry G. Harmon, president of Drake University. Missionaries and nationals from Disciple mission fields in Africa, Asia, Japan, Southeast Asia and North America were among the speakers.

The 40th anniversary of the United Christian Missionary Society was observed in several addresses, a pageant, and a luncheon at which 5.000 were served. The society, one of the largest mission corporations in American Protestantism, began in a merger of several boards in Cincinnati in 1919 in the midst of one of the most devastating doctrinal controversies in the history of the Disciples. It has weathered many storms and stands today with a net worth of over $10,000,000, 227 foreign missionaries, a membership of 245,000 in its women’s organizations, and a vast service organization employing hundreds of staff and field workers.

Spiritual highlight of the assembly was the traditional convention observance of the Lord’s Supper on Sunday afternoon when an estimated 13,400 partook of the sacred emblems of Christ’s death and suffering. An effective biblical liturgy centered the thought of the convention on Christ as in no other session.

Christian aesthetics were given unusual prominence at Louisville. Impressive dramas, such as “This Burning Hour” by Kermit Hunter of Hollins College and “The Circle Beyond Fear” by Darius Leander Swann of Christian Theological Seminary, were well received. A panoramic view of the “Decade of Decision” in Scripture, music, message and commitment and a music festival presented by mass choirs of four major Disciple colleges filled most of the closing day. The proceedings represented a strange contrast with the deeply evangelistic stance of Disciples’ national gatherings for more than 100 years.

Business sessions were largely concerned with resolutions, which: urged effective means of cleansing mass communications without invoking a deadening censorship; commended the code of decency in motion picture production; condemned “apostles of discord” and the controversial Air Force manual; pledged renewed loyalty to the National and World Councils of Churches; and endorsed proposed integration of the International Missionary Council and the World Council of Churches.

Overshadowing all other resolutions were those dealing with interracial issues. Highly controversial and causing deep rifts in certain sectors of brotherhood life, these pronouncements put teeth into the church’s traditional stand on racial discrimination. They call for integrated church life at all levels. The National (Negro) Christian Missionary Convention has been temporarily incorporated into the UCMS orbit and will later be completely integrated with the International Convention. The National City Christian Church, on the edge of a large Negro area in Washington, will eventually face serious problems as a result of one action. Early in the convention. Kring Allen, integrationist agitator, precipitated an embarrassing situation for conferees. Because Congolese delegates had been refused service in certain Louisville hotels and restaurants, Allen proposed a special resolution which charged that some leaders of the church had, in the interests of “expediency,” “compromised” the convention in agreements with Louisville hostelries. Convention authorities were called upon to strictly observe a resolution passed seven years ago providing that the convention meet only in cities which would accommodate delegates without racial discrimination.

Most revolutionary action taken by the convention was in the adoption of a report “concerning brotherhood restructure.” It commits the convention to a “decade” program which may change the whole polity and program of its constituency. The report proposes that an intensive study be undertaken in the nature and mission of the church. It calls for an overall master plan for “responsible action” affecting local churches, city unions, district and state conventions, boards and agencies, colleges and seminaries, benovolent homes, the International Convention and relationships with ecumenical bodies. It proposes that the newly organized denomination be put in a legal position to negotiate with other religious bodies looking toward eventual union. Traditional congregational autonomy and self-government could be sacrificed for “independence and responsibility” within a centralized ecclesiastical framework.

The method of implementation involves so-called “listening conferences” in all sections of the nation, speakers in conventions and institutes, lectures in colleges and seminaries, articles in the religious press, books and brochures, consultations and various propaganda gadgets. A Commission on Restructure composed of from 120 to 130 representative leaders and meeting annually will make final decisions subject to convention approval. From this body a Central Committee of from 15 to 18 members will be selected which together with a paid staff will do most of the planning and handle detailed action.

Report No. 31 involving “Cooperative Policy and Practice” provides a committee for dealing with current developments in this revolutionary program. It is to provide “cooperative strategy” and new “brotherhood solidarity.” It proposes to “strengthen cooperative life” regardless of “independent claims.” The committee will give guidance and counsel to local congregations facing internal problems arising out of expected opposition to the new program. Close cooperation is to be maintained with the Year Book Committee (which lists approved ministers and churches), the Home and State Missions Planning Council, the State Societies and related agencies.

Some observers predict that these decisions at Louisville will have wide repercussions in this intensely congregational body and could well result in the loss of hundreds of churches and ministers from presently tenuous relationships with the convention.

Dr. Perry E. Gresham, president of Bethany (West Virginia) College, was elected convention president for the ensuing year. Bethany was the first Disciples’ college.

Rival Assemblies

A last-ditch reconciliation attempt by the Reunited Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Korea failed to prevent a final schism as rival assemblies met in Seoul this fall.

The 45th General Assembly, meeting in Seoul’s Yung Nak Presbyterian Church, made a last attempt to woo back die-hard dissidents who had rejected a partial reunion effected last February. Postponing its first order of business, the assembly dispatched a reconciliation team to the opening session of the assembly organized by the dissidents and pleaded for reunion before election of opposing slates of officers would make division irrevocable.

The splinter (Seung Dong) Assembly, however, meeting behind locked gates, refused even to admit the peacemakers to a committee hearing.

The Seung Dong assembly, in turbulent session, postponed for a year consideration of the explosive issue of membership in the International Council of Christian Churches. It turned instead to open negotiations for union with the Koryu Presbyterian Church, a smaller Presbyterian body in Korea related to the Orthodox and Bible Presbyterian Churches of America.

Publishing Plan

Delegates to the 77th annual conference of the Bible Fellowship Church, formerly known as Mennonite Brethren in Christ, approved plans for a denominational paper to serve its 4,000 members. The conference, held last month in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, appointed the Rev. David Thomann editor.

Rampant Immorality

Australia’s top-ranking Anglican leader says the spread of immorality is “a cancer eating at the nation’s heart.” He blames the condition largely on the distribution of indecent literature and urges concerted efforts to arouse public and governmental concern.

In his presidential address to the 32nd Synod of the Sydney Diocese last month, Dr. Hugh R. Gough, Archbishop of Sydney and Primate of Australia, declared that immorality is rampant not only among married and unmarried grown-ups but among young people and even children.

Charging also that many young people in the country are amoral, he said “immorality is bad enough, but to be amoral is infinitely worse.”

Gough said that probably no new laws of censorship are necessary, but only a “full and literal implementation of the existing laws,” and a “refusal to give way to the pressure of a few loud voices which are clamoring for a relaxation of those laws.”

Mormon Headquarters

Plans for a 38-story denominational office building to be built in Salt Lake City by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon) were announced by President David O. McKay at the church’s 130th semi-annual conference last month.

The project, described by church architects as the “greatest in the Intermountain Region,” also includes construction of a 17-story addition to the Hotel Utah, also owned by the church.

A four-level underground “self-parking” area will accommodate 2,000 automobiles, and a new church gymnasium will be provided. Working plans for the project are now under way, it was reported.

The office building—to be one of the tallest of such structures between Chicago and the West Coast—will house administrative offices of the church, the missionary department, and branch departments of the 1,600,000-member denomination.

Thorpe B. Isaacson, first counselor in the church’s presiding bishopric, told the conference that the church plans to double its 8,000-member missionary force now serving in the United States, Europe, Latin America, and the Pacific.

‘Gas-House Gang’

A space problem in your Sunday School?

If there is a service station nearby, you might want to follow the example of the young married couples’ class of Atlanta’s Peachtree Baptist Church (Sunday School enrollment: 1,157).

Every Sunday morning the class gathers at a gas station across the street from the church, with the women meeting in the office and the men in the auto wash rack.

The station was offered by its owner, Jack Mauldin, a member of the church, when he learned that the class had to give up its facilities to another adult Sunday school group.

Appropriately enough, the men’s group meeting in the service station calls itself the “Gas-house Gang.”

Exit Federation

The University of Chicago’s Federation of Theological Schools was officially dissolved as of September 30. Following dissolution, the schools which had been linked announced establishment of separate agreements, as follows:

—Disciples Divinity House will enroll all its students in The Divinity Schol of The University of Chicago and they will receive University of Chicago degrees.

—Under an arrangement between Meadville Theological School and The University of Chicago, university courses will comprise at least 50 per cent of the academic requirements for a degree from Meadville Theological School.

—Under a contract between The Chicago Theological Seminary and The University of Chicago, students of The Chicago Theological Seminary will take at least one-fourth of their course work from The Divinity School of The University of Chicago, but The Chicago Theological Seminary will have its own faculty and degree program.

—The Divinity School of The University of Chicago with its 29-member faculty will conduct The University of Chicago’s graduate theological degree programs.

Debt-free Dedication

The Methodist Theological School in Ohio, the 12th U. S. seminary supported by The Methodist Church, officially opened its doors at dedication services last month.

The five buildings on the 69-acre campus in Delaware, Ohio, cost $2,700,000, all of which has already been paid, thanks to a successful campaign headed by Dr. John W. Dickhaut, former Methodist district superintendent who was inaugurated as the school’s president a few hours before its dedication.

Classes at the new seminary began in September with an enrollment of 72 students from 13 states.

Alaskan Education

In the shadow of famed Mt. McKinley on the outskirts of Anchorage lies the campus of Alaska Methodist University which opened this fall with an enrollment of 150 students. About $3,500,000 has already been expended since planning got under way 10 years ago.

Two large buildings have already been erected on the 505-acre hilltop campus. More are to come.

The faculty includes 14 full-time and 11 part-time members. Dr. Fred P. McGinnis is president.

A 10,000-word Holy Communion “guide,” which provides for discussing fellowship at the Lord’s Table with other denominations, was adopted by delegates to last month’s 22nd biennial convention of the United Lutheran Church in America.

The statement, three years in the making, takes the place of a 20-year-old, 250-word statement which the delegates rescinded. It was prepared by a special commission composed of 10 theology professors, 4 pastors, and a synodical president.

“The time is ripe,” the statement says, “for Lutherans to initiate theological discussion with other Christian bodies regarding inter-communion … [In the meantime] no blanket judgment should be expressed about the celebration of the sacrament in interdenominational assemblies.”

Generally, the new statement discourages extremes of both “high church” and “low church” communion practices.

Dr. John W. Behnken, president of the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, restricted his comment on the ULCA statement to a reaffirmation of the conviction that there must be doctrinal unity before there can be intercommunion.

As expected, ULCA delegates unanimously endorsed a proposed merger with three small Lutheran groups: the Augustana Lutheran Church, the American Evangelical Lutheran Church and the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church.

The ULCA itself represents a union dating to 1918 of the General Synod, the General Council, and the United Synod of the South. It now has some 2,500,000 members in 4,600 congregations.

The new body, to be known as the Lutheran Church in America, will have some 3,140,000 members and will probably rank anywhere from fourth to sixth in size among U. S. denominations. The ULCA, now the seventh largest American denomination, is the biggest in Lutheranism.

If the merger is ratified by local congregations as anticipated, the constituting convention will be held in June of 1962.

The ULCA convention, held in Atlantic City, New Jersey, was marked by a prolonged debate on a disarmament statement sponsored by the Board of Social Missions.

As first presented to delegates, the statement prompted a critical address by the Rev. William B. Downey, who is now pastor of Fox Point Lutheran Church near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Downey was chaplain to the crew of the “Enola Gay,” the aircraft used to drop the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

He centered his opposition to the original draft on a section which called upon the governments of the United States and Canada to engage “in such forms of peaceful cooperation and competitive co-existence with the Communist world as will not further the totalitarian concept of control.”

“What does the statement say with regard to the defeat of Communist ideology?” Downey asked. “What word is there concerning the rollback of the forces of Sovietism? What does it say about the liberation of our own brethren of the household of faith who are now enslaved? Can we cooperate with Communist treachery?”

Downey’s remarks were greeted with enthusiastic applause, but after lengthy debate his amendment to the part of the statement he found objectionable was defeated by the delegates. He had sought a stronger anti-Communist stand.

The statement then was referred to an informal committee composed of members of the Board of Social Missions, Downey, and Dr. O. Frederick Nolde, a ULCA clergyman who is director of the Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, a joint agency of the World Council of Churches and the International Missionary Council.

The revised statement, adopted by a large majority, urged the nuclear powers “to persist in the efforts to arrive at effective multilateral agreements on the cessation of all kinds of nuclear weapons testing with provision for adequate inspection and control.”

“A moratorium on testing should be continued,” the statement added, “until every opportunity to secure such effective agreement has been utilized.”

Eliminating mention of “competitive co-existence,” it asked the United States and Canada to engage “with other governments in peaceful competition where important differences exist and in peaceful cooperation where fundamental principle is not compromised.”

Another statement endorsed by the Board of Social Missions, opposing capital punishment, was defeated 248 to 238 in the last hour of the eight-day convention.

Elected ULCA secretary was Dr. George F. Harkins, who succeeds Dr. F. Eppling Reinartz. Harkins since 1949 has been assistant to Dr. Franklin Clark Fry, ULCA president.

Stand On Sacrament Defined

Dr. F. Eppling Reinartz, retiring secretary of the United Lutheran Church in America, hailed a new statement on Holy Communion adopted by its 22nd biennial convention as “one of the principal documents to be produced by the ULCA in its 42-year history.”

Here are highlights of statement:

Presence of Christ—“There is no direct physical discernment of the presence of Christ in the sacrament any more than of the presence of God in the man Jesus. The mystery is the miracle of God’s gracious approach to man. Rationalizations are ruled out. A mystery can only be acknowledged, not explained.” Thanksgiving—“We do not offer Christ’s body and blood in thanksgiving but we offer thanksgiving for the body and blood that are given and shed for us, imparting forgiveness, life and salvation.”

Frequency—“The frequency of the sacrament, the designation of a proper ministrant, and the character of vestments are not unimportant or dismissable.… The Lutheran Church has its own organic way to deal with such practical issues.”

Fellowship of Believers—“The legally organized congregation may well provide the context within which the sacrament is normally celebrated, but as an institution it has no sacramental monopoly. The holy communion may be celebrated elsewhere as well, wherever an assembly of believers is gathered.”

Wine or Grape Juice?—“… not inconclusive is the length and unity of the tradition which specifies wine as the element commonly used.… This is not to say that grape juice may not be used either in the instance of an offence to conscience created by the use of wine or because of reasons of health.”

Communion Cup—“In the past the church has generally used the chalice for the administration of the sacrament. However, the banning of the use of a common cup by civil law in some states and general training in hygienic measures in our society have caused considerable concern about the continued use of the chalice for the administration of the sacrament. It is appropriate that the vessels used in the sacrament do not create an obstacle to the devotion of the people.”

Posture at Altar—“Contemporary parishes are encouraged to ask if kneeling at the altar for the reception of the sacrament might not be desirable for our time and circumstances.… However, this is not to be interpreted to suggest that standing is an inappropriate posture for the reception of the sacrament where local conditions make it more desirable.”

Vestments—“In the absence of local conditions to the contrary, the use of cassock, surplice and stole (by the pastor) for services of holy communion is acknowledged as generally appropriate today.”

Protestant Panorama

● The Protestant missionary force in the Congo was gradually regaining pre-independence strength as of the end of October. Even women missionaries were finding their way back, despite continued instability in the political situation.… A newly-organized agency of the Congo Protestant Council, the Congo Protestant Relief Agency is seeking additional medical help.

● Central College in Pella, Iowa, associated with the Reformed Church in America, has one of the youngest presidents on the U. S. educational scene. Arend D. Lubbers, 29, inaugurated last month, is the son of Dr. Irwin J. Lubbers, who served as Central president from 1935 to 1945.

● An advertising campaign in behalf of Churches of Christ reached into the October 31 issue of Life. The $11,000 quarter-page advertisement in Life represents the most ambitious undertaking of the Gospel Press, a non-profit foundation which raises money for promoting Churches of Christ in the secular press.

● A new organ arrived last month for the Anglican church located on the tiny island of Tristan da Cunha off the South African coast. It was a gift of Queen Elizabeth, sent to replace one accidentally dropped in the ocean during unloading operations.

● American Baptists in Burma plan to turn over all mission property to local ownership. The transfer involves more than 160 plots of land, many with churches, schools, residences, and hospitals. Burma was the American Baptists’ first mission field.

● Methodism’s newest mission hospital is located in Kapit, Sarawak (Borneo). The $175,000 plant dedicated this fall serves a population of 41,000 scattered over a territory the size of the state of Maryland. Facilities include a fleet of mobile clinics.

● The Far East Broadcasting Company plans to beam Gospel programs overseas from a new short-wave station, KGEI, with studios and a 50,000-watt transmitter in Belmont, California.

● A new missionary boat began serving isolated Philippine islands this fall with a five-member crew which includes a Protestant evangelist. The “St. Luke” also carries a doctor, a nurse, and a handyman. Skipper is Dr. Ray Bennett, who for the past 10 years has been consultant on respiratory diseases at Los Angeles General Hospital.

● The entire townsite of Hlolden, Washington, was presented as an outright gift to the Seattle Lutheran Bible Institute last month by the Howe-Sound Mining Company. Buildings on the townsite, valued at $1,750,000, are said to have been well maintained since the company ended 20 years of copper and gold mining there.

● Seven countries were represented at the 23rd annual meeting of Christian Business Men’s Committee International in Seattle last month. The CBMCI norv has nearly 500 local chapters with a world-wide membership of 15,000.

● Dr. Siegried Asche, custodian of Wartburg Castle, fled to West Germany last month after complaining to Communist authorities that his life and work had been marked by “the atmosphere of a jail.” Wartburg Castle, located in the Red zone of Germany, is famous as the retreat where Martin Luther found refuge after the Diet of Worms.

● The Granville (North Carolina) Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. overwhelmingly rejected last month an anti-integrationist proposal which would have restricted use of a new summer camp to presbytery members only.

● Chaplain (Colonel) Charles I. Carpenter, first Chief of Air Force Chaplains, will retire from military service November 30. Top Air Force officials have paid tribute to Carpenter, a Methodist, by presenting him with testimonials from government, military, and church leaders.

● Trustees of Chicago’s Northern Baptist Theological Seminary are negotiating the purchase of a 50-acre suburban site for a new campus.

The Passion Play

Before chilly autumn breezes in the Bavarian Alps coaxed an end to the 1960 edition of their decennial Passion play, Oberammergau villagers were able to enact a total of 93 performances. This year’s series, the 37th since the villagers conceived the idea of a Passion play back in 1634, was witnessed by 518,000 paying patrons and stirred many controversies.

For an appraisal of the play and the issues it raised,CHRISTIANITY TODAYcalled upon Contributing Editor Harold B. Kuhn, professor at Asbury Theological Seminary and a student of the German scene. Dr. Kuhn, who with his wife saw the 1950 play as well as the latest performance, is currently at the University of Mainz on sabbatical leave.

Those critical of the play usually base objections upon one of the following: That the play was not well done; that the village of Oberammergau commercialized the endeavor; that the effect was anti-Semitic.

As for the first objection, one must observe that the performance is basically a work of village folk art, done in pursuit of a vow made during a time of pestilence which marked the Thirty Years’ War. The play must be judged upon criteria which are applicable to such art. Such a judgment is difficult for the sophisticated, who tend to make Broadway, or Sunset and Vine, the standard. Oberammergau has no Cecil B. DeMille, and no facilities for the production of the fabulous, even if its people should desire to present an art-spectacle. The play was artistically staged and beautifully performed, the staging and costumes being the hand-work of the villagers. But the nature of the Passion play itself is such that to revise it in the manner demanded by those who would make it “authentic” and cause it to conform to contemporary “ideas of reality” would be to remove it from the sphere in which it was designed to move.

Some are inclined to view the Daisenberger text of 1860 as the bête noir, as if there came some self-conscious change over the original play during the nineteenth century. This writer has examined a copy of the text as it was about 1670, and so far as he has been able to compare, he finds that the changes made by Father Daisenberger were made, not in the direction of an alteration to suit nineteenth-century ideas and prejudices, but with a view to making the text intelligible in modern High German.

With respect to alleged commercialism of the Passion play, it needs to be borne in mind that some misunderstandings and inequities are inevitable when a village of a few thousand inhabitants attempts to present a play for more than a half million persons. The “block booking” of room, meals, and play tickets doubtless seemed harsh to some who had local connections in Bavaria. But when one seeks to be sympathetic with the problems of the village, and when he remembers the lack of control in 1950, he may conclude that the matter of tickets and accommodations was handled admirably, measured against the problems. As for the motives of the inhabitants of Oberammergau, no outsider would presume to speak the last word. However, when one realizes that the total economy of the community was disrupted for nine months, and when one views the vast quantity of physical and expendable properties involved, he will be slow to charge the Oberammergauers with being mercenary.

Regarding the alleged anti-Semitism of the play, it needs to be said that the text is taken, for the most part, directly from the four Gospels. Granted that selection and emphasis may be tendentious, it can be shown from the play as a whole that no one narrative has been utilized to the exclusion of the others. It must be faced, at the same time, that no presentation of the Passion of our Lord can be faithful to the Scripture and at the same time serve the contemporary purpose of improving relations between Christians and Jews, so long as there is any realistic facing of the fact that our Lord was crucified at the insistence of the Jewish authorities of his times. If this be anti-Semitism, then no authentic Passion play can be free of the charge.

In summary, it may fairly be said that the Oberammergau Passion play has accomplished a large task. It was able to hold the attention of people of diverse faiths—and perhaps some of no faith at all—for a performance lasting some seven hours, in a theatre definitely not constructed for comfort.

There was no resort to the usual dramatic vehicles by which crowds are held spellbound. Not one of the twenty tableaux presenting Old Testament and Apocryphal support of the scenes contained a torrid love scene; there was no alcoholism and no scene of seduction; Mary Magdalene did not even take another try at “happiness.” If the impression made upon the writer and his wife be at all typical, audience after audience left the Passion play theatre gripped by the conviction that they had seen a faithful presentation of the mighty event in which the Prince of Glory died for the sins of the world. This conviction cannot fail to persist as an abiding result, of genuine value to the Christian cause.

It seemed to this writer that the part of Christus was played with great fidelity. This is especially noteworthy in view of the demands of the role upon the performer. Not all supporting roles were played with equal effectiveness. The next strongest character-portrayals were, in order, Judas, Caiphas and Pilate. A 48-voice chorus enhanced and enriched an impressive dramatic performance.

People: Words And Events

Deaths:Rabbi Jacob Moshe Toledano, 80, Israeli Minister of Religious Affairs; in Jerusalem … Dr. Robert Marsden, 55, executive secretary of Westminster Theological Seminary; in Middletown, Pennsylvania … Dr. William M. Fouts, 73, retired professor and registrar at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Appointments: As professor of Pastoral Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary, Dr. Seward Hiltner … as executive editor of Christian Herald, Dr. Kenneth L. Wilson … as editor of The Methodist Hymnal, the Rev. Carlton R. Young.

Quote: “I welcome this opportunity to acknowledge my nation’s indebtedness to the spiritual and intellectual resources of Scotland. A symbol of this indebtedness, the Rev. John Witherspoon, stands in bronze outside the door of our church in Washington. Born in Edinburgh and nurtured in the land of his fathers, Witherspoon became a heroic leader of Americans in their struggle for independence. As such he represents a great host of Scots who helped to build my country and whose descendants give living strength to the bonds which unite our peoples.”—President Eisenhower, in a message to the 400th anniversary General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, delivered by his minister, Dr. Edward L. R. Elson of the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D. C.

A ‘Common’ Bible

A team of Protestant, Roman Catholic and Jewish scholars are working together on a new translation of the Scriptures, which they hope will win acceptance as a “common Bible” for theological and ecumenical discussions and for public school reading.

The Rev. Walter M. Abbott, editor of the national Jesuit weekly America and a leading proponent of the “common Bible” idea, says the new translation will be published in 30 paperback volumes by Doubleday in its Anchor Book series.

“The first of the volumes,” says Abbott, “is scheduled to appear in January, 1962, and it is expected that the last will appear in 1966.”

Heading the translation team is Dr. William F. Albright, renowned Methodist scholar and professor emeritus of Semitics at Johns Hopkins University. His associates include the Rev. Mitchell J. Dahood, a Jesuit priest from the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome; Dr. Moshe Greenberg and Dr. E. A. Speiser, both of the University of Pennsylvania; and Professor Bo Reicke of the University of Basel, Switzerland.

Purely Religious?

The city of Nashville’s bid to place a tax assessment of some $5,000,000 against Baptist properties was stopped short last month by the Tennessee Board of Equalization.

City attorneys may appeal the ruling, which removed from Nashville’s tax rolls $5,101,400 in assessments on denominational publishing and educational properties.

The assessments, most of which were placed on the tax rolls for the first time this year, would have yielded about $150,000 in tax revenue annually.

The bulk of the assessment—$4,796,200—was on properties owned by the Baptist Sunday School Board, publishing agency of the Southern Baptist Convention. A portion of the remainder was levied against the Sunday School Publishing Board of the National Baptist Convention in the U. S. A., Inc.

Church Giving

A record $2,407,464,641 in contributions was reported for 1959 by 49 Protestant and Eastern Orthodox denominations in the United States, according to statistics compiled by the National Council of Churches.

Average gain in contributions was reported to be 4.6 per cent above 1958 for 35 of the 49 bodies which gave comparable figures for both years.

The totals appear in an annual report issued by Dr. Thomas K. Thompson, director of the NCC’s Department of Stewardship and Benevolence.

Per capita giving for the 35 groups amounted to $69.13, of which $2.26 was earmarked for foreign missions, the latter figure representing a four-cent increase over the previous year.

Six Canadian church bodies disclosed contributions totalling $105,304,001. Among four of these reporting comparable figures for both years, total gifts averaged $54.20 per member in 1959, an increase of $1.27 over 1958. Their foreign missions contributions rose 7.6 per cent to $1.69 per member.

Agitation in Laos

Communist agitation in Laos prompted evacuation last month of a Protestant mission station at Xieng Khouang.

In Vientiane, shell fire damaged a large Roman Catholic cathedral. Sam Neua, where eight Catholic missionaries were stationed, was reported overrun by Communist troops.

The evacuated Protestant station was operated by the Christian and Missionary Alliance, which reported that all other missions activity in Laos were proceeding normally. The Alliance has 12 missionaries in Laos, and two more were due to arrive this month.

Swiss Brethren and the China Inland Mission also are represented in Laos, each with some 20 missionaries.

WCC as Mediator

Still unresolved are the strained relations between Dutch Reformed and Anglican churches in South Africa which resulted from basic differences on the apartheid issue and on the policies of Prime Minister Hendrik F. Verwoerd.

The dispute dates back to attacks by Dr. Joost de Blank, Anglican bishop of Cape Town, against the Dutch Reformed church in South Africa for its support of apartheid. There has been talk in the meantime of expelling the Dutch Reformed from the World Council of Churches.

The WCC intervened by sending a representative to arrange a round table of its South African member churches, including the Anglicans and Dutch Reformed. Negotiations progressed until the government issued an expulsion order against Anglican Bishop Richard Ambrose Reeves of Johannesburg. No official reason was given, but deportation evidently followed statements by Reeves which were interpreted as “meddling in politics.” Reeves opposes apartheid.

De Blank then balked at continuing negotiations, asserting that Reeves was a central figure in the discussions. The WCC representative was scheduled to make a new attempt at renewing talks, and de Blank’s attitude seemed to be softening last month.

The round table was originally scheduled to take place in December in Johannesburg. It may still transpire as initially planned.

B. J. M.

Christ Depicted In Modern Dress

A Sunday school booklet which includes illustrations of Christ wearing Bermuda shorts is being distributed to local congregations of the United Church of Christ.

The booklet, designed for three-year-olds as part of a new religious education curriculum, won endorsement last month from the General Council of the Evangelical and Reformed Church, which is merging with the Congregational Christian General Council to form the United Church of Christ.

Stories in the booklet are retold in nursery rhymes, and biblical figures are depicted in clothing and appearance familiar to children.

Some of the illustrations show Christ and his disciples dressed in knee-length Bermuda shorts and tuniclike shirts. Others portray them in slacks and sports coats, with slight beards and short hair.

“I can more easily imagine [Jesus] wielding his carpenter tools dressed like this than in the long robe with long sleeves in which he is usually pictured,” said Dr. James E. Wagner, United Church co-president.

Dr. Robert Koenig, director of the curriculum, cited archeological authority to support his assertion that working men of Jesus’ time customarily dressed in garb approximating short trousers and shirt. The long robe in which Jesus is traditionally pictured, he said, was used as a combination overcoat-blanket by travellers.

In approving the booklet, the General Council called on “pastors, church school teachers and parents to participate in a fair, thoughtful trial use of this new curriculum.”

John Knox. Patrick Hamilton. George Wishart. Andrew Melville. James Guthrie. Richard Cameron. Ebenezer Erskine. Thomas Gillespie. Thomas Chalmers. To call these names is to quicken the heart of a Scottish churchman as he recalls the often turbulent course of Protestant history in Scotland. Last month a special General Assembly of the Church of Scotland was held in Edinburgh to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the Scottish Reformation.

In August, 1560, the Scottish parliament had ratified Protestantism’s victory over Rome by abolishing the papal jurisdiction and the mass in Scotland and approving the Calvinistic Scots Confession which Knox had helped write. Now in October, 1960, Queen Elizabeth with Prince Philip drove in state from the Palace of Holyroodhouse—scene of Knox’s famed dialogues with another queen, Mary Stuart—to St. Giles’ Cathedral, site of some of Knox’s fieriest preaching, to join nobility, churchmen, and some 2000 others in a colorful service of thanksgiving for the Reformation.

Queen Elizabeth later became the first sovereign to address General Assembly since union of the crowns of Scotland and England in 1603, the monarch customarily being represented by a “Lord High Commissioner.” Last sovereign to attend in person was James VI of Scotland in 1602, who became also James I of England the following year.

Although head of the Church of England, the Queen is a Presbyterian while in Scotland. But she is not head of the Church of Scotland, which proclaims the sole headship of Christ.

The Queen had some pertinent things to say to the Assembly, calling the Scottish Reformation a “distant turning point in the nation’s life”:

“In spite of the bitter quarrels of the past and the divided religious loyalties which still remain with us, I belive that what happened at the Reformation can be stated in terms on which all Christians may agree. Holy Writ was liberated to the people and as a result the Word of God was revealed again as a force to be reckoned with in the affairs of both public and private life.

“The gospel which has long been revered as a record handed down from primitive Christianity was once more seen to be also a living light by which men ought to direct their lives and remold their institutions. This lesson from the Reformation is one that all Christians may surely apply to the modern world.”

The Queen’s enthusiasm for the Reformation, which drew sharp attack from the Romanist press, excels that of certain of her churchmen. Some Church of Scotland ministers wonder whether it is possible in 1960 to have equal interest in celebrating the Reformation and in promoting the ecumenical movement. Some fear the former will heighten old divisions while others see the latter jeopardizing their doctrinal heritage. Energetic synthesists attempt to find indications that the Reformers would have favored the course of modern ecumenism.

Speaking in Edinburgh’s St. Mary’s Cathedral (Scottish Episcopal), the Archbishop of York, the Most Rev. Arthur M. Ramsey, noted losses as well as gains of the Reformation. “There was the loss of the historic succession of the ministry.… No longer was there observed the Christian year with Good Friday, Easter, the commemoration of the saints.…”

The Very Rev. George F. MacLeod, former General Assembly Moderator and colorful leader of the Iona Community, deplored as idolatry any attempt to “re-create” that earlier Reformation (“they would recover the old Confessions; reinstitute a catechism”). Inasmuch as the Renaissance gave “birth to the ecclesiastical Reformation,” asserts Dr. MacLeod, writing for The Glasgow Herald, we must not “try to recover” the Reformers’ insights, but rather “look at our modern environment and see what it says to us.”

Part of what it says to Dr. MacLeod, his fellow churchmen would find quite unsettling. To be in “the true line of the Reformers,” he calls for a renewed doctrine of man’s worth in a machine age, a recovery of a sense of mankind’s unity, and an energetic search for church unity. Then pacifist MacLeod seems to issue a tentative call for rebellion against a nuclear-armed government. He uses Knox’s words: “ ‘To which party must Godly persons attach themselves in the case of a religious nobility resisting an idolatrous Sovereign?’ We all know what his [Knox’s] final answer was.… Unless ‘the sovereignty of the monstrous regiment of the damned bomb’ is annulled soon, may it be that the real celebration of the Reformers will be seen in the witness of those who, for the freedom of men, and, indeed, for the continuance of civilization, unilaterally rise up against the possibility of its use? High treason? Yes indeed. And was not Knox a traitor?”

Dr. MacLeod has long had a considerable following, particularly among students, this being coupled with a long record of being voted down in General Assembly after making vivid and moving speeches for unpopular causes.

His Renaissance-flavored article is silent on such great Reformation themes sounded by Knox as justification by faith and not works, an Augustinian view of sin, the sole mediatorship of Christ, and the unique authority of the Scriptures.

The oft caricatured John Knox, besides having a strong sense of humor, possessed a conviction that the Scottish kirk was in doctrine and in fact part of the true Catholic Church, from which the Church of Rome was deviate. Listen to him as he answers a Jesuit: “… Our kirk is no new found kirk (as the writer blasphemously rayleth) but it is a part of that holy kirk universall which is grounded upon the doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles, having the same antiquitie that the kirk of the Apostles has as concerning doctrine, prayers, administratioun of sacraments and all other things requisite to a particulare kirk.… And, therefore, albeit we have refused Rome and the tyrannie thereof, we think not that we have refused the societie of Christis kirk; but that we are joynit with it, and dayly are fed of our mother’s breastes, because we imbrase no other doctrine than that which first flowed furth of Jerusalem, whose citizenes be grace we awen ourselves to be.…”

The great power of Knox’s speaking led the first Queen Elizabeth’s very critical ambassador to write from Edinburgh that this “one man” was “able in one hour to put more life in us than five hundred trumpets continually blustering in our ears.” Onetime galley slave of the French and later faithful student of Calvin in Geneva, Knox was to lead the Scots people, says Philip Schaff, “from medieval semi-barbarism into the light of modern civilization” as he gained his place in history beside Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin.

Though he brought Scotland closer to England in helping to break up the “auld alliance” with France, his countrymen have through the centuries believed that to Knox more than any other man Scotland is indebted for its political and religious individuality. Mary Queen of Scots had hoped to use Scotland as an instrument in the international Roman Catholic reaction, to the injury of the national welfare. In contrast, since the union of Scottish and English crowns (1603) and parliaments (1707), the Church of Scotland has acquired popularity as one of the few surviving witnesses of an independent Scottish nationality. Scottish Presbyterianism has stood for freedom from ecclesiastical tyranny and corruption, and also for the rights of the middle and lower classes against the crown and the aristocracy.

Its constitution as contained in the Church of Scotland Act, 1921 (a preparatory act toward the 1929 church union of the Church of Scotland and the United Free Church) sets forth an unmistakable antithesis to Erastianism, “a free Church in a free State”: “Recognition by civil authority of the separate and independent government and jurisdiction of this Church in matters spiritual, in whatever manner such recognition be expressed, does not in any way affect the character of this government and jurisdiction as derived from the Divine Head of the Church alone, or give to the civil authority any right of interference with the proceedings or judgments of the Church within the sphere of its spiritual government and jurisdiction.” While establishment in Scotland has no great practical importance, its emotional value as a perpetual recognition of national Christianity is considered to be large.

In the latter part of the nineteenth century, Schaff referred to “the Presbyterian Church of Scotland” as the “most flourishing of the Reformed Churches in Europe,” unsurpassed in “general intelligence” and evangelistic and missionary zeal. Indeed, the church bears a distinguished record in the field of biblical exposition through great preaching and enduring commentaries. Yet, more recent assessments have usually been considerably less optimistic than Schaff’s. The church does not pretend it has been “setting the heather afire.” Theological dilutions have dulled the old keen sense of mission. Divinity professors on the same faculty offer widely varying views on basic matters of doctrine. Church attendance is proving a worrisome problem. With some 1,300,000 adult communicants, two of every three members do not attend services with any regularity, a record inferior to that of the smaller Protestant churches and Roman Catholics.

Calvinism is no longer strong, though in Barthian form it has gained new friends through theology professor Thomas F. Torrance of New College, University of Edinburgh. The writer, when a student at New College, recalls a Scots student assuring him of “new life to come” in the church due to the coming of dialectical thought in place of a theology which mediated between Continental neo-orthodoxy and American liberalism. But neo-Kantianism still survives, and Bultmannism is on the horizon.

Friends of Scotland will desire the best for her kirk. The Glasgow Herald was warily hopeful when it recalled the Reformers’ aim to be the making of every citizen into a “profitable member of the commonwealth.… To their success … qualified indeed as it was, Scotland owes the godliness and integrity which once were the marks of her people.… No better celebration of the fourth centenary of the Reformation could be imagined than the return of Scotland, Church and nation, to the ideal of the godly commonwealth.”