Book Briefs: June 23, 1958

Hellish Procedure

Brain Washing, The Story of Men Who Defied It, by Edward Hunter, Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, New York, 310 pp., $4.

The sobering fact that one-third of all American war prisoners in Korea who survived the ordeals of imprisonment eventually collaborated with the communists should make this book one of the most carefully read of our day. Unfortunately, it has not had wide circulation, and wherever communists have their way, it will be suppressed.

Edward Hunter is probably the free world’s outstanding authority on the meaning of, and techniques used, in brain-washing. In a previous book, Brain-Washing in Red China, Hunter gave a gruesome picture of that which had taken place. And at first this book was viewed skeptically by some because little was known with regard to this scientifically formulated process whereby the wills and even personalities of men might be warped and finally molded into a new pattern, basically abhorrent to them. However, as time went on, it was realized that Mr. Hunter knew what he was talking about, and his views were received with increasing respect.

This second book is important because it shows how brain-washing is accomplished, and also how it may he defied. The strength of his writing lies in the case-histories, the painstaking accumulation of evidence, and the clarity of presentation. The importance of the book is that we are warned against a hellish procedure which is now a stock-in-trade of world Communism.

Brain-washing has been called Menticide—murder of the mind—and this is a graphic and true description. That some have denied the existence of such a procedure makes it all the more imperative that it be understood and prepared for.

For one thing, it is obvious that to be successful, brain-washing depends primarily on the subjects’ ignorance of it. Where it is understood, effective resistance has been high as has been demonstrated by many of our own soldiers in Korea. As a matter of fact, it was Communism’s aggressive war in Korea that brought to the free world a knowledge of what brain-washing really is.

The technique of brain-washing is built on the known ability to develop conditioned reflexes by outside influence. Through this there is a deliberate program to bring about basic changes in human nature, one of which is the destruction of the individual I, replaced by the we of collectivity. Self-examination, confessions, self-accusation, and the repeated use of fixed phrases are all designed for one specific purpose—the breaking of the mind and will of the individual, and these designs have a diabolical cleverness as well as a diabolical effect.

The author states: “Brain-washing was revealed as a political strategy for expansion and control made up of two processes. One is the conditioning, or softening-up process primarily for control purposes. The other is an indoctrination or persuasion process for conversion purposes. Both can be conducted simultaneously, or either of them can precede the other. The Communists are coldly practical about it, adjusting their methods to their objective. Only the results count for them.”

One effect of the thoroughly brainwashed individual is his complete inability to stand by himself. The truly indoctrinated communist must be part of collectivity. He must be incapable of hearing opposing ideas and facts, no matter how convincing or how forcibly they bombard his senses.

In many ways brain-washing is more like a treatment than a formula. Each of the two processes that make it up are themselves composed of a number of different elements. Brain-washing is accomplished through hunger, fatigue, tenseness, threats, violence, and in some cases by the use of drugs and hypnotism. There is a period of “learning” which inevitably leads to confession. These two are interrelated and absolutely necessary to the procedure. No one is permitted to retain his own individuality as this is recognized as a deadly menace by the whole monolithic structure.

Hunter makes this arresting statement: “Brain-washing is a system of befogging the brain so a person can be seduced into acceptance of what otherwise would be abhorrent to him.” The book shows how the various elements of brain-washing are used—i.e., hunger, in which the minimum amount of food that a man can eat and still survive is kept carefully tabulated, and then cut by one-third. Fatigue is pushed to the point where even suicide is a welcome relief because of prolonged sleeplessness.

Tenseness is maintained by threats, promises, cajolery, by the holding out of hope one day, and dashing it to the ground the next. This is used to develop a sense of hopelessness and inevitable surrender. Kept in solitude and subjected to these multiplied pressures, along with threats of violence, often carried out, men break physically, mentally and spiritually.

Because it is necessary to understand the disease before there can be an effectice cure, Hunter devotes much of his book to a description of the theory and practice of brain-washing and the giving of documented cases. But the usefulness of the book is most enhanced by a study of the means whereby breakdown can be defeated.

Army medical personnel made an exhaustive study of the men who capitulated to Communism in prisoner of war camps in Korea, and they came up with the fact that these men lacked spiritual and moral convictions, an understanding and appreciation of our American heritage, discipline in the sense of a basic concept of right and wrong, and an understanding of Communism and its propaganda methods. Many of them had come from broken homes and few of them had had any church training or religious ties.

Hunter corroborates fact this to the fullest extent and shows that where men have had deep spiritual faith and moral convictions, they have largely been impervious to brain-washing. He quotes individuals who found the source of sustained strength in prayer and in reading the Bible. Where the Scriptures were not available, as was almost always the case, they spent their time bringing to mind Bible verses, and repeating them over and over. Hunter says, “The people I interviewed were mostly down-to-earth, practical men who could not be swept off their feet by emotionalism. The Shanghai lawyer, the Budapest engineer, the top-sergeant from Korea, and the automobile salesman from Detroit, were men of the world. Still, they declared that the most important elements in their survival were faith and prayer. So did the majority of those who went through Red brain-washing.”

Robert A. Vogeler, American businessman who was kept in a Red Hungary prison (and whom the reviewer has met and heard speak), said he tried, during his long days and nights of incarceration, to recall exactly what the New Testament had said. He gave himself the task of bringing back to mind the verses he had learned as a boy in Sunday School. He made a practice in prison of saying grace whenever he ate, no matter what sorry pretense of a meal was put before him. He keenly felt the lack of a Bible and kept asking for one. As a result of his experience, Vogeler came out of prison more than just a practical businessman; he became a man with a mission.

Mr. Hunter has rendered the free world a great service in writing this book. It is our hope that those in positions of responsibility, both in church and in state, will take the time to read it, ponder its message, and prepare themselves accordingly.

L. NELSON BELL

A Rationalistic Defence

The Resurrection of Theism, by Stuart Cornelius Hackett, Moody Press, 1957. 381 pp., $5.

Professor Hackett’s new book has already created a considerable amount of interest. It was a major topic of discussion at the November 1957 Philosophical Conference under the auspices of the department of Bible and philosophy at Wheaton College. Before his recent move to the philosophy department chairmanship in Louisiana College, Professor Hackett was a member of the Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary faculty in Denver. President Vernon Grounds of that institution writes an enthusiastic introduction. The conservative position of Moody Press is well-known.

Hackett’s work is a reaction against the anti-intellectual tendencies against which James Gresham Machen so vigorously warned. Even since Machen’s day there has been a movement among Bible-believing Christians to abandon the historical, factual and rational evidences of Christianity. It has been said that the use of inductive argument is worse than worthless. It is held that in dealing with unbelievers we must simply demand that they accept Christian presuppositions, or else—. Professor Hackett takes the position, maintained by a continuous line of great theologians throughout the entire history of the church, that the presentation of the Christian message should include rational, inductive, and synthetic arguments.

There are some great books like Warfield’s Revelation and Inspiration and A. A. Hodge’s Atonement about which we can say with satisfactory confidence, “That’s it. That is the book for our generation on the topic designated.” Has Professor Hackett given us such a book on the subject of Theism?

There are certain grounds for a negative answer to the above question:

The implications of Professor Hackett’s title are put into words by President Grounds as follows, “Ever since Immanuel Kant wrote his monumental Critique of Pure Reason, theistic discussion has proceeded on the postulate … that the existence of God can neither be demonstrated nor disproved by reason.… By and large … the alleged demolition of the venerable ‘proofs’ has been taken as a fait accompli by schools of all persuasions whether agnostic or liberal or neo-orthodox or even evangelical.”

Now, there is nothing new in the experience of younger scholars assuming that what is new to them is new to the world. But as a matter of fact, a long line of eminently competent philosophical theologians like Robert Flint and James Orr have masterfully answered Kant’s objections. Hackett’s title, “The Resurrection of Theism”, is a misnomer, though it is indeed a fresh approach to certain current problems.

The method of approach, called “rationalistic empiricism” is an example of an extreme form of rationalism. The laws of reason, including not only the basic axioms of logic, but also the Kantian categories, or an adapted form of them, and including a rigid totalitarian law of causality,—this rationalistic complex is binding a priori for both God and man! Hackett’s form of argument, “does not at all exempt God’s Being from the casual axiom; it certainly is legitimate and necessary to ask for the cause of God’s existence” (p. 292). Professor Hackett believes that he saves theism by saying that the cause of God’s existence is not exterior to his being, but interior. He holds that there is something in the character of God which causes God to exist. It would seem that the question of externality or internality of cause would be of no consequence, if God’s being is held to be dependent upon any cause whatever. The fallacy in Kant’s handling of the theistic arguments is found in that he thought God must be conceived as dependent upon a logical syllogism, or pure reason. On the contrary, the God of the Bible simply exists, eternally and independently. Professor Hackett is in error in thinking that it is a logical axiom that every event and every being must have a cause. In fact the simple observation that the world exists and that causality is observable in finite things requires us to believe that something must be eternal, unless something comes from nothing. The Christian answer is, God the uncaused, eternal being.

The concept of God being subject to the law of causality almost leads to Spinozistic pantheism. We read, “Spinoza will clarify the point: just as Spinoza held that substance was completely comprehended by a multiplicity of attributes, each of which was a complete embodiment from its own point of view of substance itself so we maintain that all reality is completely explicable in terms of two principles—law and purpose—each of which is a complete account, from its own point of view, of reality itself” (p. 353).

The scriptural doctrine of election is thoroughly misunderstood and rejected (pp. 172ff.).

The answer to the problem of evil is very badly mangled. “The existence of irreducible or real evil results in every case from a contingency that is necessarily involved in those determinate conditions which are themselves essential to the creation of a universe whose ultimate end is the production and progressive development of rational, moral selves” (p. 351f.).

Men with devout Christian hearts may certainly wander far in their rationalizations. There are many cases of logical non-sequiter in Dr. Hackett’s work, and also many other excellent and even brilliant insights which should be presented if there were space.

J. OLIVER BUSWELL, JR.

Theistic Idealism

Crucial Issues in Philosophy, by Daniel S. Robinson, Christopher, 1955. 285 pp., $5.

Out of his later years Dr. Robinson views crucial issues facing the West from the window of philosophical idealism, which he has long expounded. Lectures and essays roam the writings of classical and contemporary philosophers with an eye on social, political and religious concerns. Fifteen chapters deal in somewhat more practical than theoretical vein with modern problems, a dozen more with representative modern philosophers, mostly of idealistic and theistic temper.

“Since 1600 our civilization has been generating a new tension that has recently culminated in a spiritual crisis, of which the first and second world wars were merely phases,” Dr. Robinson notes. “Unless the tension … can be … overcome our civilization and culture will be dethroned” (p. 18).

To reconcile the tension between inherited Christianity, modern scientific research and political democracy—which Communism is today exploiting for revolutionary ends—Dr. Robinson turns to theistic idealism. He disowns Brightman’s finite God.

Aware of the theistic existentialist revolt against the absolutistic conception of reality espoused by Royce and Hocking, he nonetheless thinks the Christian existentialists may be retelling the Christian message so that contemporaries will believe that Jesus is the Son of God (p. 248). But the speculative thrust predominates over the theology of revelation. For while Dr. Robinson properly discerns the Pauline doctrine that “the personality of Jesus is identical with the divine Logos,” he falls into the idealistic fallacy when he extends that doctrine to mean that “the God who is incarnate in Jesus is also incarnate in every believing Christian” (p. 247).

CARL F. H. HENRY

Misunderstanding

The Reformation, by Will Durant, Simon and Shuster, New York, 1957. $7.50.

This is the fifth volume of Will Durant’s magnum opus “The Story of Civilization,” and in order to cover the period 1300–1564 it runs, like the preceding volumes, to over 1,000 pages. The earlier topics with which the author dealt naturally posed their problems; but this one, requiring careful evaluation of some of the most controversial movements in history, must have laid upon the author a particular burden.

The weight of this burden must have been especially heavy in Durant’s case since he attempts to make himself master of the whole of Western world history, and so has been obliged to limit himself largely to secondary sources which at times lead him astray. Moreover, for one who was born into the Roman Catholic communion but apparently moved over to a type of Protestant liberalism, it must have been difficult for him to develop very much sympathy for the sixteenth century Reformers.

His study of the humanistic, political and economic developments in northern Europe between 1300 and 1564 is stimulating and interesting. On the other hand, his facility for generalization and epigrammatic statement sometimes leads him or the reader astray. Despite this, however, his work in this field, if read with due care, provides a useful summary of the Northern Renaissance.

It is his efforts to deal with the Reformers which rouse the most fundamental criticisms. While he tries at times to be sympathetic and understanding, it is clear that he simply is not able to grasp the basic spirit of either Luther or Calvin. Indeed, sometimes he has even failed to understand their plain teachings, as for instance, in the case where he states that Luther kept most of the medieval church’s doctrines (p. 571), or where he refers to the Reformers’ doctrine of “justification or election by faith” (p. 465). A blow at Calvin, whom he dislikes intensely, comes at a point where he refers to that Reformer’s doctrines as the “most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honored history of nonsense” (p. 490).

Perhaps Durant would have understood the Reformation better had he read some of those who have favored it, viz., Doumergue, Bohatec, Rupp and others. But as it is, not only are there misstatements of fact, but one cannot help feeling that to the whole Reformation, the author is in fundamental opposition, and that therefore any true understanding of it is precluded.

W. S. REID

Unified Insight

A Survey of The Old and New Testaments, by Russell Bradley Jones, Baker Book House, 1957. $5.95.

In many ways this is an excellent book. It is definitely conservative in theological outlook, it is written in a clear understandable style, and indicates that the author, who is head of the Department of Bible and Religious Education at Carson-Newman College, Jefferson City, Tennessee, is a man of excellent judgment.

This last point is evident again and again throughout the book. Thus, in discussing divine sovereignty and human responsibility, the author does justice to both (p. 23). He rejects the fantastic restitution-theory with respect to the story of creation (p. 35). He does not tolerate an unfair attack on the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints (p. 329). He gives a summary-interpretation of Revelation 20 which is satisfying (p. 360).

What is perhaps the outstanding virtue of the book is the fact that the author makes us see the history of revelation as an organic whole. It is all one story, the story of God’s redeeming love. I recommend this book for those who wish to gain a unified, organic insight into the story of redemption as revealed in the Bible.

I do have a few criticisms to make. It would seem that the author has struggled with the problem of giving a survey both of the Bible story and of the Bible books within the very limited space of 372 pages. His treatment of the story is excellent. This is not always true with respect to the books. In fact, some of them receive hardly any attention: to Nahum only a few lines are devoted; to the entire Gospel according to John hardly two pages. Also, the chosen themes and divisions are often difficult to study or memorize. Frequently, too, it is not clear how the divisions are related to the theme.

It is perhaps due also to the author’s ample treatment of the story, that very little space is left for the treatment of well-known problems, e.g., less than a page is given to the Synoptic problem.

It is puzzling to understand how the author, in bestowing high praise upon a number of listed Bible translations, of which he says, “In no instance is the Word of God being deliberately changed,” and in which he characterizes the translators as “devout scholars for whose consecrated toil we should be thankful,” can include the Revised Standard Version, without offering a word of criticism (p. 20). The one redeeming feature in this connection is that the author does mention in his bibliography the work of O. T. Allis, Revised Version or Revised Bible? But these criticisms do not in any way take away the fact that Jones has written a fine book on Bible history.

WILLIAM HENDRIKSEN

Teaching Children

Beyond Neutrality, by M. V. C. Jeffreys, Pitman, London, 8s.6d.

The author is Professor of Education at the University of Birmingham, England, and one could wish that all who hold similar posts in the universities of the world were such as he. In five excellent chapters Professor Jeffreys sustains the plea that the cult of moral and religious neutrality in the teaching profession shall be brought to an end. By means of cogent arguments the author insists that unless a teacher both has and reveals convictions of a moral and religious kind he is failing in the most elementary aspects of his duty in the education of the young lives entrusted to him. The important guiding principle for a teacher is that he is not teaching “subjects”: he is teaching children. A child is a developing person and needs the stimulus not merely of factual information, but of challenging ideas. The directionless feature of so much present-day education denies to the child-person those very elements that make for a strong mind, a steadfast character, and a full personal life. The best way of indicating the healthy tone of these lectures and likewise to commend them to the serious teacher is to quote a few sentences:

“It is sometimes maintained that, in matters of belief, the teacher ought to ask questions, never to answer them; that anything more positive than a question-mark must prejudice the intellectual liberty of the pupil by putting someone else’s ideas into his head. This evasion of the educator’s responsibility, in the name of freedom, rests, however, on the false assumption that the positive presentation of a view of life is incompatible with the cultivation of the pupil’s critical judgment. The truth surely is that powers grow by exercise, and a person will never learn to withstand propaganda who has never been exposed to the force of opinion. The guarantee of freedom is not the teacher’s neutrality but his respect for the integrity of his pupil’s personality. Let the teacher preach the faith that is in him so long as he desires his pupil to exercise responsible judgment more than he desires him to accept the teacher’s opinions. The minds and souls of the young are safe with the teacher at the heart of whose faith is reverence for human personality. This is the one condition that reconciles freedom and authority. Without it, there is no escape from anarchy on the one side and tyranny on the other.”

This is a little volume that should be placed in the hands of every potential teacher and it would do experienced teachers no harm to read it.

ERNEST F. KEVAN

Neo-Orthodox Sympathies

Basic Christian Beliefs, by W. Burnet Easton, Jr., Westminster, Philadelphia, 1957. 196 pp., $3.75.

This book purports to delineate and defend biblical Christianity. Stating that Christianity is a supranatural religion, the author notes that such a faith, rather than mere obedience to the Christian ethic, is essential if one is correctly to be called Christian. In a provocative analysis of faith and reason, he shows that the “naturalist,” as well as the “supernaturalist,” is dependent on faith, and in a valid criticism of the traditional theistic proofs he points out in effect that they at best prove the existence of a God.

He holds an extremely low view of inspiration whereby he maintains that the biblical writers were storytellers who often invented details that did not or could not have happened. For him the Bible “speaks the Word of God only to those who go to it in faith and expectancy,” and here as elsewhere he shows clearly his neo-orthodox sympathies. While he does not accept the Genesis account of original sin, he does believe that all men are sinful and in need of reconciliation with God. He speaks of the Atonement as the great indispensable Christian doctrine but is all too vague as to its meaning, and he regards the Resurrection as a subjective group experience. He anticipates a final Judgment, but no eternal punishment.

The author, now a professor at Park College, Missouri, has written an interesting readable book, which is definitely theistic. But the Christianity that he depicts, based as it is on human reason and experience rather than divine revelation, is at best a badly deformed type.

CHARLES H. CRAIG

Ecclesiastical Year

Resources for Sermon Preparation, by David A. MacLennan, Westminster, Philadelphia, 1957. 239 pp., $3.75.

There are 308,647 churches in the United States, and of these 39,614 belong to denominations that adhere rather closely to the traditional Christian year, with its fixed Gospel and Epistle selections. The other 269,033 use either free texts, or else follow a modified Christian year that has become more or less recognized in recent years. The traditional Christian year devotes every Sunday to some incident relating to the earthly ministry of our Lord or to his teachings. The modified church year sets apart certain days such as Universal Bible Sunday, Brotherhood Sunday, Rural Life Sunday, Mothers’ Day, Fathers’ Day, Nature Sunday, Labor Sunday, etc. It is with this latter ecclesiastical year that Dr. MacLennan’s book is concerned.

It is not a book of sermons, but rather of suggested thoughts for sermons. For example, during the Lenten season, he includes not only such subjects as “How to Keep Lent” and “How Christ Saves Us,” but “Proud of This News,” “Sky Hooks Monday through Friday,” “What’s Life All About,” “Hearing Aids” and “How’s Your E.Q.?”

In his suggested texts, which are printed in full, the author usually uses the RSV, Moffatt, Phillips or Barclay. The homiletical thoughts range from seven pages for Easter day to six lines for “Mountains of the Bible” and three lines for “A Summer Series.”

Dr. MacLennan is pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church, Rochester, N. Y., and is a teacher of homiletics at Colgate Rochester Divinity School. He delivered the 1955 Warrack Lectures on Preaching at the Universities of Glasgow and Aberdeen.

F. R. WEBBER

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