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 OCT 201925 
 
 
 
 
 AND MODERNISTS 
 
 ny 
 
 C. J. SODERGREN 
 
 a 
 
 ROCK ISLAND, ILL. 
 AUGUSTANA BOOK CONCERN 
 
Printed in the United States of America. 
 
 « 
 
 ROCH ISLAND, ILLINOIS 
 AUGUSTANA BOOK CONCERN, PRINTERS AND BINDERS 
 
 1925 
 
<‘There are, it may be, so many kinds 
 of voices in the world, and no kind is 
 
 without signification.”? Z Cor. 74:70. 
 

 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 I. INTRODUCTION. 
 
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 PAGE 
 

 
I. INTRODUCTION. 
 
 N THE days of Christ there were two promi- 
 nent religious parties, the Pharisees and the 
 Sadducees. 
 
 The Herodians were a political party. They 
 were the supporters of the dynasty of Herod and 
 therefore the professional ‘‘patriots” of the day. 
 They were closely allied commercially with the 
 Sadducees, the great financiers of Jerusalem. 
 Because they realized in Jesus a foe of their 
 political aims and money revenues, they made 
 common cause with the Pharisees to crush Him. 
 They found it impossible to tolerate His infringe- 
 ment of the vested rights of the merchants and 
 bankers in the temple courts. We are therefore 
 not surprised to find them figuring with this pow- 
 erful party in the attempt to entrap Him in the 
 matter of tribute to Cesar (Mk. 12. 18). 
 
 The scribes were a professional guild. They 
 were the “Doctors,” or Teachers of the Law. In 
 modern terminology they were the theological 
 
 7 
 
& FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 professors of the Jewish Church. In Mt. 18. 52 
 Jesus uses the title in a favorable sense. Ordi- 
 narily they took no part in public affairs outside 
 of their special vocation, but devoted themselves 
 to the study and exposition of the Scriptures. 
 Their chief concern was to safeguard the ortho- 
 dox doctrine, which, however, they amplified and 
 embellished with innovations in a most arbitrary 
 manner. “Orthodox” therefore gradually came 
 to mean their own interpretations and personal 
 opinions, largely determined by individuals of 
 recognized authority in their schools. They were 
 concerned, not so much with Scripture itself, as 
 with what might be called their “Book of Con- 
 cord,” and, again, not so much with their body of 
 doctrine, as with the generally accepted and tra- 
 ditional interpretation of these confessions. It 
 was this latter interpretation which became the 
 “heavy and grievous burdens” which they bound 
 and laid on men’s shoulders (Mt. 23. 4). On any 
 subject whatsoever, social, political, scientific, or 
 religious, the fact that these rabbis said so and 
 so was decisive and final. “An offence,” they 
 taught, “against the sayings of the scribes is 
 worse than one against those of Scripture” (Sanh. 
 XI. 3). Their students had only two duties: to 
 retain everything faithfully in their memory; and 
 never to teach otherwise, even in expression, than 
 
AND MODERNISTS 9 
 
 they had been taught. We also know the inordi- 
 nate vanity of the profession and what sticklers 
 they were about being properly addressed as 
 “Rabbi.” In Mk. 12. 38 Jesus singles them out 
 as an object of warning. ‘Beware of the scribes, 
 who desire to walk in long robes, and to have 
 salutations in the marketplaces, and chief seats 
 in the synagogues, and chief places at feasts” (Lk. 
 20. 46). 
 
 THE PHARISEES. 
 
 The Pharisees were the party of the funda- 
 mentalists and literalists, in a derogatory sense. 
 They were not “‘hypocrites” of the type we usually 
 associate with the name, but a group of spiritual 
 leaders, properly designated as “legalistic pie- 
 tists,” quite sincere in their faith, and driven into 
 dissembling only by their reactionary attitude 
 toward Jesus and by the alternative with which 
 He confronted them and which they refused to 
 accept. In this they were entirely consistent, be- 
 cause from their point of view He was a rank 
 liberalist of the order that ‘“‘hath denied the faith 
 and is worse than an infidel.” That is, they were 
 sincerely false. They believed that they alone were 
 in the right. They believed in the Bible. They 
 were orthodox in doctrine. They were staunch 
 defenders of the faith. The theology elaborated 
 
10 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 by their theologians was in their opinion infalli- 
 ble. It could never be altered. On anything that 
 seemed to threaten its foundations they turned 
 with swift resentment. Woe unto the man who 
 as much as questioned the tradition of the elders 
 or doubted their interpretation! 
 
 History has proven them to be in the wrong. 
 They themselves were unable to see it. The rea- 
 son was that they mistook the form for the sub- 
 stance. They clung to a dead body and did not 
 notice that its spirit had fled. They were too 
 conservative to leave the old camping ground and 
 follow the pillar of cloud and fire a stage nearer 
 the promised land. Consequently they kept their 
 faces stolidly and stubbornly fixed toward the 
 cherished past. And when prophets sent from 
 God urged them to ascend the mountain heights 
 of a fuller revelation, they turned on them and 
 rent them. Of course they went through the for- 
 mality of heresy trials, but this was mere pre- 
 tence. They were agreed on the verdict in 
 advance. 
 
 The observance of the Sabbath, for instance, 
 must be kept at all costs, according to their own 
 strictly literal interpretation and detailed appli- 
 cation of the commandment. If it happened to 
 be honored in the breach by Christ Himself or by 
 some healed paralytic, they promptly condemned 
 
AND MODERNISTS 11 
 
 these non-conformists as “sinners” and went 
 serenely on tithing mint and anise and cummin, 
 leaving undone the weightier matters of the law, 
 namely, justice, mercy, and faith. And if some 
 Nicodemus in their own circle or a restored blind 
 man presumed to question the wisdom of their 
 policies or the justice of their course, he was 
 promptly “bawled out” or thrown out. 
 
 While professing to honor the prophets of the 
 past, they proved their “false sincerity” by per- 
 secuting the new prophets. For such a religion 
 is always harsh and cruel. Partly because a faith 
 that is a matter of the head, and not of the heart 
 and life, is always merciless and ruthless when 
 opposed or crossed. Partly because it feels in- 
 secure and afraid, and finds it expedient to safe- 
 guard its interests by hard-headed and hard- 
 hearted diplomacy. Accordingly, to effect their 
 ends they took the short-cut of force — legal or 
 physical. The smoldering fire which subcon- 
 sciously inspired their tactics and finally burst 
 into open flame appears in the policy adopted 
 toward Christ and His followers. ‘Behold, I 
 send unto you prophets, and wise men, and 
 scribes; some of them shall ye kill and crucify; 
 and some of them shall ye scourge in your syna- 
 gogues, and persecute from city to city” (Mt. 23. 
 24). “And they watched him, and sent forth 
 
12 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 spies, who feigned themselves to he righteous, 
 that they might take hold of his speech, so as to 
 deliver him up to the rule and the authority of 
 the governor” (Lk. 20. 20). “And when he came 
 out from thence, the scribes and the Pharisees 
 began to press upon him vehemently, and to pro- 
 voke him to speak of many things, laying wait 
 for him, to catch something out of his mouth” 
 (Lk. 11. 53). “‘Thou wast altogether born in sins, 
 and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out” 
 (Jn. 9.34). “This man ceaseth not to speak 
 words against this holy place, and the law... . 
 They cried out with a loud voice, and. stopped 
 their ears, and rushed upon him with one accord; 
 and they cast him out of the city, and stoned him” 
 (Acts 6. 13; 7. 57, 58). 
 
 There was indeed a prophet whom they did not 
 persecute openly. But the motive is well ex- 
 pressed by themselves, “All the people will stone 
 us, for they are persuaded that John was a 
 prophet” (Lk. 20. 6). 
 
 Meanwhile they were persuaded that they had 
 the truth. So why should they trouble themselves 
 with listening to “heresy”? And if occasionally 
 a ray of light pierced the armor of their preju- 
 dice, they were keen enough to see that it was 
 impossible to incorporate it with their old system 
 of doctrine and therefore they carefully excluded 
 
AND MODERNISTS a3 
 
 it. To change their attitude would have meant a 
 radical spiritual change and a violent intellectual 
 revolution to which they were not equal. They 
 had no desire for the new wine. They said, The 
 old is good (Lk. 5. 39). Because they were un- 
 dergoing spiritual atrophy they refused to con- 
 sider the proposition that Jesus might be right 
 and they wrong. The case was closed to argu- 
 ment. 
 
 To doubt that they were in possession of the 
 truth was to jeopardize Scripture, the Church, 
 the temple, the nation, their institutions, their 
 standing, and all the interests of the established 
 religion. Hence they felt perfectly warranted in 
 shutting their minds to everything that might 
 tend to undermine the traditions and unsettle 
 their own persuasions. For the same reason they 
 also considered it perfectly legitimate to resort 
 to extreme measures in dealing with individual 
 “apostles of heresy.” Indeed they had no other 
 choice if they were to save themselves and their 
 theology. So they adopted the policy of forcible 
 repression, and with a perfectly good conscience. 
 “They shall put you out of the synagogues; yea, 
 the hour cometh, that whosoever killeth you shall 
 think he offereth service unto God” (Jn. 16. 2). 
 Those who refused to submit to their authority 
 
14 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 they excommunicated, branded as “sinners,” and 
 thanked God they were not like them. 
 
 There were moreover good reasons for their 
 complacency. Among their number we find such 
 noble characters as a Nicodemus, a Joseph of 
 Arimathea, a Gamaliel, and especially a Saul, who 
 could say of himself, “As touching the righteous- 
 ness which is in the law, found blameless” (Phil. 
 3. 6). As stated above, they were strict in the 
 observance of the Sabbath, in tithing themselves, 
 and in fasting, even going beyond the require- 
 ments of the law. They were imbued with a fiery 
 missionary zeal. Not indeed to make converts to 
 Judaism, but to make proselytes to their own 
 “denomination.” What Jesus thought of this kind 
 of missionary enterprise is recorded in Mt. 28. 15. 
 They believed in the immortality of the soul, in 
 angels, in the resurrection of the body, and in 
 future retribution. They believed in the speedy 
 coming of the Messiah through the air. No doubt 
 Satan had this popular theology in mind when he 
 suggested to Jesus that He cast Himself down 
 from the pinnacle of the temple and so appear to 
 the people as if dropping down out of heaven. 
 They looked for His literal reign upon the earth 
 in Jerusalem. His kingdom was to be a kingdom 
 of the saints, and they were the saints. He was 
 to deliver them from the power of the Gentiles, 
 
AND MODERNISTS 15 
 
 especially the Romans, and He was to thrust out 
 the sinners, Sadducees in particular, from the 
 inheritance of God. 
 
 All these materialistic notions they backed up 
 with the Bible, and according to their baldly 
 literal reading of prophecy they:were in the 
 right. No one was able to dispute it. The possi- 
 bility of a more spiritual insight into the Word 
 of God simply did not occur to them. They knew. 
 And yet the sad fact remains that when their 
 Messiah did appear, they failed to recognize Him. 
 The Spirit of God had departed from a dying 
 Church, spiritual vision was only a memory and 
 a name, faith had lost its sight, and so they 
 stared at divine truths with the bovine gaze of 
 the natural man, seeing only words. 
 
 All sources present the Pharisees to us as a 
 distinct “church within the Church.” They did 
 not separate themselves from the Jewish com- 
 munity in doctrine, and they worshiped with their 
 fellow-countrymen in the temple and in the syna- 
 gogues, but they kept aloof from social intercourse 
 with the “worldly” mass of the people to avoid the 
 risk of being defiled by the less scrupulous. They 
 considered themselves as the real Israelites, Israel 
 according to the spirit, while the common people 
 were the ’am ha’ arez, the vulgar herd. We recall 
 the fault they found with Jesus because of His 
 
16 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 friendly intercourse with publicans and sinners. 
 This was enough to condemn Him in their sight. 
 He in turn said to them, ‘‘Woe unto you, Phari- 
 sees! for ye tithe mint and rue and every herb, 
 and pass over justice and the love of God” (Lk. 
 11. 42). And to His disciples He said, “Beware 
 ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypoc- 
 Fisys) CUked 221): 
 
 THE SADDUCEES. 
 
 The Sadducees were the liberalists and ration- 
 alists of that day. As such they were cordially 
 hated by the Pharisees, and the former recipro- 
 cated by thoroughly despising the latter. Accord- 
 ing to Josephus they accepted the entire Old 
 Testament, and not the Pentateuch only. But 
 this did not prevent them from playing fast and 
 loose with the Scriptures. In fact they were 
 largely indifferent to religion, except as a matter 
 of curious interest, custom, means of preferment, 
 and source of revenue. The tradition of the 
 elders, to which the Pharisees attached supreme 
 importance, the Sadducees disregarded entirely. 
 They rejected the literal interpretation of proph- 
 ecy. They denied the providence of God and 
 maintained that man was the master of his des- 
 tiny and the sole author of his own happiness or 
 misery. They denied the existence of angels and 
 
AND MODERNISTS 17 
 
 spirits, the resurrection of the dead, and future 
 rewards and punishments. And they had scant 
 sympathy with the Pharisees in their Messianic 
 anticipations. 
 
 All this stamped them in the eyes of the people 
 as sceptics and infidels. Their pride and callous- 
 ness of heart made them still more unpopular, 
 while the Pharisees were held in high regard. The 
 reason why Jesus directed His rebukes mainly 
 against the scribes and Pharisees, and said so 
 little about the Sadducees, was no doubt due to 
 the insignificant influence of the latter in religious 
 matters. And in the final combined attack on 
 Him the Sadducees were doubtless influenced less 
 by religious zeal than by the natural fear that a 
 messianic movement might result in disastrous 
 political consequences. When on one occasion they 
 approached Him on the question of the resurrec- 
 tion, we notice the spirit of levity and their pat- 
 ronizing contempt for Him by adducing the ex- 
 ample of the woman who had had seven husbands 
 (Mts22- 25): 
 
 The leaders among the priests, especially those 
 of the highpriestly family, all belonged to the 
 party of the Sadducees. They were the clerical 
 aristocrats, at the same time that they were 
 frankly irreligious. It was the Sadducees who 
 carried on the traffic in the temple which yielded 
 
18 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 such handsome profits to lessors and lessees alike. 
 They were closely allied with the Roman govern- 
 ment and were leaders in the Hellenizing of Pales- 
 tine. After the resurrection of Jesus they were 
 the main instigators of the persecution against 
 the apostles and their followers. Jesus combines 
 them with the Pharisees in the warning to His 
 disciples, ‘“Take heed and beware of the leaven 
 of the Pharisees and the Sadducees” (Mt. 16. 6). 
 There was no Pharisee, Sadducee, Herodian, or 
 scribe, among the Twelve.* 
 
 The reason for the existence of these parties, 
 and especially the spirit which inspired them, was 
 the spiritual decline and general decay which 
 marked the end of that age. They were desperate 
 attempts at a solution of the problems created by 
 the dissolution of the old order. Each party 
 trusted to its own panacea for curing the ills of 
 the times. But as the leaders were treating symp- 
 toms instead of the deeply seated disease, things 
 went steadily from bad to worse. God had more- 
 over “judged” — discarded —the past and was 
 displacing it with a new dispensation. Hence all 
 efforts proved unavailing. Their final attempt to 
 save themselves, the church, the nation, was the 
 crucifixion of Christ. Following hard upon this 
 
 
 
 * For further information see various monographs on these parties, 
 and the respective articles in the encyclopedias. 
 
AND MODERNISTS 19 
 
 summary rejection of their only hope, these par- 
 ties renewed the old feud, growing ever more 
 hostile and bitter against each other, till their 
 internecine war in the siege of Jerusalem broke 
 down all resistance, delivered the city into the 
 hands of the enemy, and buried them all in the 
 smoking heap of its ruins. 
 
20 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 II. DISCUSSION. 
 
 HE signs of our own times indicate the ap- 
 proach of a similar situation. The rarer 
 spirits in our midst who sense the invisible under- 
 tow in both Church and State are unanimous in 
 the conviction that we are drawing near the end 
 of another dispensation. Symptomatic of the 
 change are corresponding movements, rapidly 
 crystallizing into parallel religious parties. Two 
 main groups are assuming definite shape, already 
 characterized by name as Fundamentalists and 
 Modernists. The following pages are an attempt 
 to analyze these aggregations, with the purpose of 
 assisting the reader to get his bearings and enable 
 him, if possible, to direct his course through shift- 
 ing winds across a rising sea. 
 
 A. THE FUNDAMENTALISTS. 
 
 There is an almost infinite variety of these. In 
 the nature of the case it is impossible to define 
 them. And yet the importance of making at least 
 approximate distinctions is becoming more and 
 more evident. One of the main reasons for the 
 
AND MODERNISTS 21 
 
 present contribution is a growing realization that 
 the frequent failure to discriminate properly here 
 is a fertile cause of much unnecessary distress of 
 mind and many preventable tragedies. In spirit 
 and tendency, however, there is discernible a 
 Right and a Left, and it will suffice for our im- 
 mediate purpose to divide them into these two 
 groups. 
 
 THE TRUE FUNDAMENTALISTS. 
 
 This group adheres to the foundation doctrines 
 of the Christian religion as revealed in the Word 
 of God. In this sense every true Christian is a 
 fundamentalist, and can be nothing else, as these 
 doctrines are the source and content of a saving 
 faith. 
 
 Among these fundamental doctrines are the fol- 
 lowing: the existence of a personal Triune God, 
 the Creator of heaven and earth; the Deity of 
 Jesus Christ; the virgin birth; His atonement for 
 sin by a sinless obedience unto death; regenera- 
 tion by faith in Him alone as our vicarious sacri- 
 fice; His literal resurrection; His second coming; 
 the gift of the Holy Spirit to the Church; the 
 divine inspiration of the Old and New Testa- 
 ments; the reality of heaven and hell; the resur- 
 rection of the dead; the judgment of the quick 
 and the dead. 
 
22 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 Certainly, a man may believe all these doctrines 
 in his head and still be an unbeliever at heart. 
 The mere fact that he gives intellectual assent to 
 them and professes to accept them is therefore 
 not fundamental. Faith is no mouthing of intel- 
 lectual creeds. The main question is not, What do 
 we believe? but, In whom do we believe? Not, Do 
 we have this or that opinion about religious mat- 
 ters? but, Do we believe (-lieve, lieben, love, trust) 
 in Christ? To make five, or seven, or a hundred 
 dogmas the object of faith, instead of a person, 
 the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, is a radical 
 departure from the fundamentals of the Christian 
 religion. The Gospel is not merely a gospel about 
 Jesus and His teachings; it is the gospel of Jesus 
 and the religion of a loving and adoring self-sur- 
 render to Him. 
 
 A faith that is the incarnation of revealed 
 truth, translated into such a living trust, is not 
 to be belittled; and those who cherish these fun- 
 damental doctrines in their hearts and convert 
 them into the obedience of faith are not to be 
 lightly disparaged. 
 
 They cannot be eliminated from consideration 
 with impunity. Their voices cannot he safely 
 disregarded. Their testimony must be taken into 
 account and its message heeded if truth is what 
 we desire. The genuine fundamentalist may be 
 
AND MODERNISTS 23 
 
 sincerely wrong at times, but even so he merits 
 neither abuse nor condescension. He may only 
 need to realize that there “is more light yet to 
 break out of the Word.” To ridicule the work of 
 grace in the hearts of humble, sincere believers 
 as a superstition, a delusion, or the work of the 
 devil, is infamy itself. To scoff at beliefs, “held 
 by sincere and noble men who have achieved 
 noble and sacrificial lives, is to betray a narrow- 
 ness quite unworthy of religious men. A cheap 
 and easy scepticism has no healing for the woes 
 of civilization. The ‘spirit that denies’ cannot 
 rescue the broken world from its disillusion and 
 despair. The so-called liberals have sometimes in- 
 dulged in a scornful treatment of beliefs which 
 have given millions victory over pain and grief 
 and evil, and by such an attitude have strength- 
 ened reactionary orthodoxy. Only great beliefs 
 can be the foundation of great character. Only 
 a positive faith can speak with authority and 
 bring us permanent help” (W. H. P. Faunce). 
 
 The spiritual instinct of these humble believers 
 senses truth even where ideas and language may 
 at times be at fault. The intuition of the spirit- 
 ual-minded man is ever truer than all the reason 
 and erudition of mere scholars. 
 
 For this very reason the Fundamentalist also 
 may need to be reminded that faith is not fur- 
 
24 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 thered merely by using a4 megaphone or by in- 
 dulging in viciousness of spirit. Pounding heads 
 with hard doctrines does not plant them in human 
 hearts and make them fruitful in Christian lives. 
 It is also well to learn what Jesus emphasized and 
 to keep things in the same proportion. This is a 
 safer course than to make a hobby of single doc- 
 trines and to thrust them out into space in such 
 a manner as to make them high vaulting-bars in- 
 stead of inviting paths of peace. 
 
 One of the truest representatives of this group 
 among noted writers on the subject is A. J. Gresh- 
 am Machen of Princeton. His latest work, ‘“‘Chris- © 
 tianity and Liberalism,” will repay careful read- 
 ing. 
 
 THE PSEUDO-FUNDAMENTALISTS. 
 
 This group of Fundamentalists is the spurious 
 kind, which places an entirely unwarranted em- 
 phasis on shibboleths not occurring in our accept- 
 ed creeds, but which have seeped in from the out- 
 side and which prove on examination to consist 
 largely of “the commandments of men.” We have 
 our authoritative formulas, based on the plain 
 words of Scripture and accepted by the Church 
 as the statement of its Christian faith. The other 
 kind of would-be authority is derived from in- 
 dividual teachers and a certain ill-defined general 
 
AND MODERNISTS 25 
 
 consensus of opinion, which has grown into a 
 body of ecclesiastical tradition. And this is the 
 “orthodoxy,” which our pseudo-fundamentalists 
 are riding like charging cavalry with drawn sa- 
 bers, bent on destruction. 
 
 Some of these doctrines are science falsely so 
 called and are not dangerous, except as they may 
 obstruct spiritual vision and smother budding 
 faith. But some of them are also theological doc- 
 trines, so intimately mixed by these fundamental- 
 ists with our Canonical Symbols, that it often 
 requires no little acumen and skill to disentangle 
 them. And these are the more dangerous, as we 
 are so easily deluded into accepting them, along 
 with the authoritative teachings, as infallible and 
 final. There are, for instance, certain theories of 
 inspiration constructed and superimposed by in- 
 dividual dogmaticians; a literal interpretation of 
 the Bible so unspiritual as to shut out completely 
 the Spirit of the living Christ; geometrical defini- 
 tions of the Trinity which foist sheer polytheism 
 on simple and unsuspecting minds; and Jewish 
 conceptions of the Kingdom, past, present, and 
 future, which tend to close the eyes of men to the 
 expanding vistas of a truly prophetic perspective. 
 
26 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. 
 
 Our own doctrines say very little on Origins 
 and Eschatology (First and Last Things). In 
 this the Reformers showed their wisdom and their 
 humility. In this reticence there is also a source 
 of comfort for those who find themselves unable 
 to accept every fancy and phantasy that floats 
 along on the shifting winds of these latter days. 
 That is, we find that we have a right to our Chris- 
 tian profession, even when we must differ occa- 
 sionally with some of our brethren and prefer to 
 wait for more light, especially when we sense that 
 some of their theories do not seem to harmonize 
 with the mind and spirit of the Christ we have 
 learned to know and love. 
 
 “But you must believe the Bible.” Yes, and we 
 do. Perhaps with a faith equally deep. But what 
 these brothers mean is that we must accept their 
 particular exposition of this, that, or the other 
 Seripture passage. Therefore we feel free to ob- 
 serve that we have an equal right to give a modi- 
 fied answer at times to their “‘must”. We need to 
 be on our guard against being made captives tc 
 the opinion of men. It is one thing to “bring into 
 captivity every thought to the obedience of 
 Christ,” while “casting down imaginations and 
 every high thing that exalteth itself against the 
 knowledge of God.” But it is quite another thing 
 
AND MODERNISTS 27 
 
 to allow faith itself to be bound hand and foot by 
 religious “‘Fascisti,” or to be hounded by a group 
 of zealots very much akin in spirit to the Ku Klux 
 Klan. 
 
 Even our Symbols profess to be only “witness- 
 es.” In their own language, “Other writings 
 (beside the Scriptures) of ancient or modern 
 teachers, whatever reputation they may have, 
 should not be regarded as of equal authority with 
 the Holy Scriptures, but should altogether be sub- 
 ordinated to them, and should not he received 
 other or further than as witnesses as to in what 
 manner and at what places, since the time of the 
 apostles, the doctrine of the prophets was pre- 
 served.” Again, “The other symbols and writings 
 are not judges, as are the Holy Scriptures, but 
 only a witness and a declaration of the faith, as 
 to how at any time the Holy Scriptures have been 
 understood and explained in articles in controver- 
 sy in the Church of Christ, by those who then 
 lived, and how the opposite dogma was rejected 
 and condemned.” (Formula of Concord, Introd. 
 1b and 3d). Truly liberal enough in matter and 
 tone, and most refreshing in their spirit, while 
 affording precious testimony to the truth as re- 
 vealed to us by God in His sacred Word! 
 
 The “hundred-percenters,” on the other hand, 
 . wish to improve upon these witnesses by adding 
 
28 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 as of equal authority their own personal opinions 
 and by means of these to keep us under the dou- 
 ble guard of a “superior kind’ (?) of religious 
 “patriotism.” But while we elect to exercise the 
 freedom secured to us by the Protestant Reforma- 
 tion and refuse to be dragged into the dungeons 
 of a new Inquisition, God forbid that our liberty 
 in Christ should prove to be the lawlessness of 
 unbelief. May it prove to be instead a humble 
 loyalty to the truth of His Word and to its glori- 
 ous echo in the formulated doctrines of our 
 Church, as this truth is accepted by Christian 
 faith, proved by Christian experience, and coura- 
 geously confessed in word and deed by Christian 
 witnesses to its saving and transforming power! 
 
 J UDAISERS. 
 
 It may be of value to note in this connection 
 that the spirit which actuates the Pseudo-Funda- 
 mentalists with distressing frequency finds a 
 rather remarkable prototype in the so-called 
 Judaisers of the early Christian Church. These 
 extremists originated in “certain of the sects of 
 the Pharisees who believed.” For the most part 
 these legalists were sincere believers in the Lord 
 Jesus as the Messiah, and by no means the “hypo- 
 crites” it might appear. They merely insisted on 
 the traditional doctrines and demanded with the 
 
AND MODERNISTS 29 
 
 fiery zeal of conviction that “it was needful to cir- 
 cumcise them (the Gentile converts) and to 
 charge them to keep the law of Moses” (Acts 
 15. 5). 
 
 Impassioned zeal and the tone of authority are 
 always impressive, and this enthusiasm and self- 
 confidence on their part exerted such influence 
 that several of the churches were brought to the 
 verge of disruption. We get a glimpse of this 
 spirit in 2 Cor. 10. 12, “For we (Paul) are not 
 bold to number or compare ourselves with certain 
 of them that commend themselves; but they them- 
 selves, measuring themselves by themselves, and 
 comparing themselves with themselves, are with- 
 out understanding.” Their propaganda threat- 
 ened a serious schism in the entire Church and 
 finally made necessary the Apostolic Council in 
 Jerusalem 50 A.D. But though the decree of this 
 council included certain temporary concessions to 
 the Jewish Christian “fundamentalists,” many of 
 these reactionaries refused to accept the main 
 conclusion of this ““Synodical Meeting.”’ They ac- 
 cused Paul of being a rank ““liberalist,” a rene- 
 gade and a traitor to his people and his God. They 
 dogged his footsteps from city to city, disparaged 
 his character, his apostolic authority, and his 
 teaching. We recall how even Peter was intim- 
 - idated by their presence in Antioch to compromise 
 
30 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 and dissemble, till he stood corrected by the open 
 rebuke of his friend Paul (Gal. 2. 11). Even as 
 late as the latter’s first imprisonment in Rome 
 these Judaisers were in evidence and saddened his 
 great heart by their machinations. By this time, 
 however, he was confident that even the vexatious 
 controversies which they occasioned and their 
 “preaching Christ even of envy and strife” would 
 serve to further the Gospel and issue in its final 
 triumph (Phil. 1. 15-19). 
 
 The intolerance and persecution evinced by the 
 modern Pseudo-Fundamentalists, inhibits their 
 usefulness. Sane men and women are becoming 
 impatient with those who are so ready to consign 
 to the flames those who do not agree with them 
 in every particular. The attitude which says, 
 “Disagree with me, and you are a crook,” is be- 
 coming only to a “fuddlementalist.” The spirit 
 of the following clipping for instance from “The 
 Searchlight’ only invites the derision of fair- 
 minded men: “$100 reward. The Searchlight is 
 going to offer a reward. It will deposit in the 
 bank a $100 cashier’s check to be given to a stu- 
 dent of any denominational college in the south 
 who will supply the Searchlight with evidence 
 that modernism is taught in the school where the 
 said student attends.” And the editor promises 
 not to divulge the name of the student, so that the 
 
AND MODERNISTS 31 
 
 informer may be kept immune to discipline. The 
 number of “rewards” is limited to twenty. 
 
 Such submarine attacks are poor policy, to say 
 nothing of their “Christianity.” The following 
 words of Dean Farrar are deserving of serious 
 consideration in this connection: ‘‘The worst of 
 all heresies in any Christian, and the heresy that 
 Christ holds as most inexcusable, however com- 
 monly and however bitterly it betrays itself in 
 our controversies, is the heresy of hatred. If a 
 man be animated by that spirit — be he the most 
 dreaded champion of his shibboleth, the foremost 
 fugleman of his party —if he be guilty of that 
 heresy, his Christianity is heathenism, and his 
 orthodoxy a cloak of error.” Usually too this 
 “odium theologicum” is not the emphasis of con- 
 viction, but of persuasion. Often enough, more- 
 over, it is the vociferation of mere opinion, if not 
 indeed the wrath of wounded egotism. Fortunate- 
 ly only a special type is fitted for plying the ne- 
 farious trade of religious detective and spy. All 
 honest men will go on their way doing their daily 
 duty, observing rather than aiding and abetting 
 those who enjoy this form of ministration. 
 
 We commend for further consideration the lan- 
 guage of the twelve points reached by the Lan- 
 guage School at Wu Fu Ssu, near Peking, China, 
 
 - as follows: 
 
32 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 “1, I will always seek to discover the best and 
 strongest points in my brother’s position. 2. I 
 will give him credit for sincerity. 3. I will try 
 to avoid classifying him and assuming that he has 
 all the characteristics of the class to which he is 
 supposed to belong. 4. I will emphasize our agree- 
 ments. 5. When others criticise I will try to bring 
 out favorable points. 6. When there is misunder- 
 standing, either I of him, or he of me, I will go 
 to him direct. 7. I will seek opportunities to pray 
 together. 8. I will try to remember that I may 
 be mistaken, and that God’s truth is too big for 
 my mind. 9. I will never ridicule another’s faith. 
 10. If I have been betrayed into criticising an- 
 other, I will seek the first opportunity of finding 
 out from himself if my criticism is just. 11. I will 
 not listen to gossip and secondhand information. 
 12. I will pray for anyone from whom I differ.” 
 
 LITERALISM. 
 
 A serious fault with the Pseudo-Fundamental- 
 ists is their crassly literal understanding of the 
 Scriptures. Professing to be spiritual-minded they 
 seem to be strangely lacking in spiritual vision. 
 If this kind of literalism is not actual materialism, 
 it is certainly the vision of a one-eyed faith en- 
 tirely sans vista. The gift of the Spirit should 
 reveal the things of the Spirit (1 Cor. 2.14). For 
 
AND MODERNISTS 33 
 
 that Spirit enables us to see that the thoughts of 
 God cannot be fully expressed in human language 
 and that the grammatical sense cannot exhaust 
 His mind. Scripture is an unfathomable and in- 
 finite ocean of truth, as inexhaustible as its divine 
 Author. Only sheer blindness imagines that we 
 can sound its depths with our short plummet. To 
 limit its truth to our finite comprehension also 
 looks like an effort to control it in a small fear 
 that it may get beyond our own control, or like 
 an attempt to make it a mere armory of texts to 
 serve as weapons within our own ready reach for 
 personal offense and defense. Such an attitude 
 takes on the appearance of not being able to trust 
 either God, His Word, or our fellow-Christians 
 out of our sight and to have no faith in anything 
 but our own little views and ingenious designs. 
 He who draws a definite circle around a Scripture 
 passage and sets up the sign “No Trespassing” 
 only reveals his own serious limitations, both 
 spiritually and mentally. He may need besides to 
 be warned not to play the role of the dog in the 
 manger. 
 
 We Occidentals must remember that the lan- 
 guage of the Bible is Oriental. God did not choose 
 the superficial, prosy, matter-of-fact business 
 tongue of the West. He elected to employ the 
 | poetic, figurative, richly colored and musical lan- 
 
34 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 guage of the East. We intellectualistic “pale- 
 faces’ sem to find it so impossible to view spiritual 
 truth from any other angle than that of our rigid 
 science and precise mathematics. And we are so 
 amusingly conceited about it too. 
 
 In limiting themselves, and in the efforts to 
 limit others, to the first surface idea a word sug- 
 gests, these brethren are most unfortunately 
 identifying themselves with a theory of inspira- 
 tion which has never been a part of the Christian 
 faith, but which is originally only the doctrine 
 of some spiritually near-sighted dogmaticians. 
 The ancient creeds contain no reference’to such a 
 view. Our later creeds say nothing about it. Yet 
 many honest souls are being conscientiously led 
 to believe that the Christian religion stands or 
 falls with this theory. These teachers are no 
 doubt inspired by the purest zeal, but this should 
 not prevent them from pausing to consider wheth- 
 er it is wise and kind to expose their disciples to 
 the danger of losing their fatth when the theory 
 collapses, as collapse it must when shaken by the 
 seismic disturbances of actual findings by modern 
 criticism. 
 
 Assuredly what the Bible says is true. But the 
 content is divine and eternal, and not merely tem- 
 poral and human. It is therefore not to be re- 
 duced to the low level and narrow span of our 
 
AND MODERNISTS 35 
 
 finite comprehension. If we limit its truth to 
 what we can pack down in our little hand-made 
 band-boxes we are doing nothing less than help- 
 ing to destroy the very faith we are in the effort 
 to champion and either driving men and women 
 by the tens of thousands into the Liberalist camp 
 or smothering many a future songster by forcing 
 him back into the hard shell of our patent inter- 
 . pretation of the Bible. This is the great crime of 
 every dying church at the end of its period. Again 
 and again, with the very best of intentions, such 
 churches have attempted to exorcize the spirit of 
 doubt by whipping its children to death with the 
 lash of the letter, when possibly there might have 
 been some better way of treating their mental 
 troubles and curing their spiritual ills. 
 
 Among the true Fundamentalists we find many 
 literalists who are men of the highest integrity, 
 guileless as the day, and filled with true zeal for 
 the honor of God and the salvation of souls. They 
 are actively and unselfishly engaged in serving 
 the Lord where others stand aloof and even pre- 
 sume to smile at them with a supercilious smile. 
 They are consecrated as well as sanctified and de- 
 voted believers in the Lord Jesus. And this after 
 all is the main thing. All else is of secondary im- 
 portance. But we believe most sincerely that the 
 faith of men to-day and the enlargement of the 
 
36 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 borders of the kingdom would be furthered still 
 more in the long run if these spiritual leaders 
 might rise to some of the higher levels which lead 
 up to the view-point of the Teacher who left this 
 re-echo in the hearts of two disciples: “Was not 
 our heart burning within us, while he spoke to 
 us in the way, while he opened to us the Scrip- 
 tures” (Lk. 24. 32). 
 
 SCRIPTURE ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 If this surface exegesis were consistent with it- 
 self the mischief wrought would not be so tragic. 
 But the Bible itself is its own refutation of it. 
 A few examples will suffice. For instance, “He 
 shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his 
 heel” (Gen. 3. 15). One good brother may re- 
 mark, ‘“‘God does not state specifically that this is 
 to be understood in any other sense than that of 
 the strictly literal statement. Consequently the 
 passage means that the seed of the woman was 
 to crush the physical head of a serpent and in the 
 process suffer similar injury to his own physical 
 heel. And everybody else must understand it in 
 the same way as I do, or he is not a believer, for 
 evidently he does not believe the Bible.” But 
 another brother may feel privileged to put a 
 somewhat different construction on the passage, 
 rather more, he believes, in harmony with the 
 
AND MODERNISTS svi 
 
 Spirit that inspired it and more in accord with 
 the facts of its fulfilment. The same applies to 
 many another passage. To deny this is to lay our- 
 selves open to the charge made by Paul against 
 the unbelieving Jews, “But unto this day when- 
 soever Moses is read a veil lieth upon their heart” 
 (2: Cor-3F 157: 
 
 Again, “And thou shalt bind them (the com- 
 mandments given) for a sign upon thy hand, and 
 they shall be for frontlets between thy eyes” 
 (Dt. 6. 8). The command is clear, and it is to the 
 credit of the Pharisees that they were consistent 
 and actually wore small boxes containing these 
 words in writing on their wrists and on their 
 foreheads. They were driven to it by their crass 
 “hermeneutics.” But is this exactly what God 
 meant when He spoke — and still speaks — these 
 words to us? 
 
 Again, when Jesus says, “I came to cast fire 
 upon the earth,” one brother may understand by 
 “fire” physical fire, such as destroys our northern 
 forests. And in defence of such a position he 
 may add, “The Bible says ‘fire’, that is, natural 
 fire, especially as it does not state that this is a 
 parable, or that it is to be taken figuratively.” 
 Another brother may take the liberty to differ. 
 Not with the Bible, but with the coarse realism of 
 the exposition. 
 
38 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 Again Jesus says, “He that hath none, let him 
 sell his cloak and buy a sword” (Lk. 22. 36), and 
 there is no statement in the context to the effect 
 that this is to be taken in a spiritual sense. We 
 recall the “interpretation” of the disciples when 
 they said, ‘Lord, behold, here are two swords.” 
 One of these swords was in the hand of the im- 
 petuous Peter and he shortly proceeded to use it 
 in very much the same manner as other equally 
 sincere and equally misguided disciples have done 
 since then in loyal “defense of Christ.” 
 
 When Jesus warned His disciples to ‘‘take heed 
 and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees” (Mt. 
 16. 6), they immediately gave His words a literal 
 meaning and “reasoned among themselves, say- 
 ing, We took no loaves.” We remember the almost 
 impatient rebuke, “‘How is it that ye do not per- 
 ceive that I spake not to you concerning loaves?” 
 But here some friend will reply that Jesus ex- 
 plained that He was using figurative language. 
 Yes; but evidently He had not intended to; nor 
 did He explain till the surprising obtuseness of 
 the disciples made it necessary. And suppose He 
 had not explained, or that we had no record of 
 an explanation, would we have no choice but to 
 understand Him as referring to kitchen bread? 
 Would not His words have continued to bear the 
 same spiritual meaning, the meaning of His own 
 
AND MODERNISTS 39 
 
 divine mind, even though the additional dialog 
 had not followed? 
 
 Again, “If thine eye causeth thee to stumble, 
 pluck it out and cast it from thee: it is good for 
 thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than 
 having two eyes to be cast into the hell of fire” 
 (Mt. 18. 9). No hint at all that these words are to 
 be taken figuratively. Yet we do not find any of 
 our modern literalists obeying the injunction in 
 anything but a spiritual sense. 
 
 Compare also Peter’s exposition of Ps. 16. 8-11 
 in his Pentecost sermon. (Acts 2. 25-31). Asa 
 sample of many similar New Testament quota- 
 tions of Old Testament texts it will repay care- 
 ful study. 
 
 The Pseudo-Fundamentalists not only persist 
 in putting these limitations on the Word of God 
 — not indeed on the instanced passages, but on 
 many another passage — though they cannot help 
 but see how inconsistent they are and how im- 
 possible the rule is of uniform application. They 
 also presume to judge and condemn brethren who 
 wish to save the Bible from being buried in this 
 napkin and whose purpose is to make room for 
 the larger faith and the deeper conviction which 
 brings joy and peace to the hearts of men. This 
 misguided perseverance is sometimes due to the 
 policy of “safety first’’; sometimes to a pet theory 
 
40 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 which requires this means of vindication; some- 
 times to one or more blind-spots in their spiritual 
 vision. But more often it is due to a most laud- 
 able fear of losing the childlike persuasion which 
 is their all of faith. Deep conviction has no other 
 choice than tu contend earnestly for what appears 
 to be the truth and the only truth, especially when 
 jeopardized by “strange doctrine.” “See that ye 
 despise not one of these little ones” (Mt. 18. 10), 
 these spiritual children. To rob them of their 
 only interpretation would be to snatch the Bible 
 out of their hands and leave them poor indeed. 
 Our only contention is that they in turn do not 
 insist on limiting others to these limitations. For 
 this again would be to snatch the Bible out of the 
 hands of those who believe in the same Bible as 
 the inspired Word of God, but whose very faith 
 compels them to apply the words of Isaiah 54. 2. 
 “Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them 
 stretch forth the curtains of thy habitations; 
 spare not: lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy 
 stakes.” 
 
 To embalm the body of Scripture with the sweet 
 spices of tradition (“as is the manner of the Jews 
 to bury’’?) may be both piety and faith. And 
 those who adopt this manner of preserving what 
 is left to them should not be denied this beautiful 
 expression of devoted love. And yet, to make the 
 
AND MODERNISTS Al 
 
 Scriptures only the final resting place of their 
 hope and guard it with jealous fear of intrusion 
 is hardly consistent with faith in the risen, living, 
 and omnipotent Truth. There is a better founda- 
 tion for faith than the stone of literalism before 
 the door. There is no need to lament if it should 
 prove to be rolled away. A Mary Magdalene may 
 arrive at a hasty conclusion of her own and say, 
 “They have taken away the Lord,” but it will not 
 be long till such souls as she, the other women, 
 and the male disciples, will hear a familiar voice 
 speak peace to their troubled souls. 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHICAL BASIS. 
 
 Before leaving this phase of Pseudo-Funda- 
 mentalism it may be of value to observe that 
 many of these theories appear to have their 
 source in the camp of the philosophical “Intellect- 
 ualists”, here represented by a certain type of 
 Calvinist, legalist in spirit and rationalist in psy- 
 chology. They must “understand,” and make that 
 understanding the criterion of truth, though 
 Henri Bergson for one has shown how irrational 
 this is and how impossible it is to lay hold of 
 actual truth with the hand of mere logic or the 
 crude tools of mechanical intellect. On the other 
 hand, those who find the letter of Scripture trans- 
 parent and luminous with a divine effulgence may 
 
42 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 be classed with the ‘“‘Voluntarists.”” The Intellect- 
 ualist sees the Bible as the flat picture of, e. g., 
 a great cathedral; the latter sees it as the cathe- 
 dral itself and enters the sanctuary to pray. To 
 the former the Bible is a concave dome, with suns, 
 planets, and satellites all on the same surface; to 
 the latter it is an infinite universe of solar sys- 
 tems in a perspective of vast spacial interrela- 
 tions. The former climbs briskly up to its stars, 
 plucks them down, sorts them, labels them, prices 
 them, and markets them; the latter gazes up at 
 the constellations of that same heaven in silent 
 adoration and prostrates himself in worship at 
 the feet of their Creator. 
 
 According to present indications it would seem 
 as though the one group of voyagers were drift- 
 ing into a position where the only choice is be- 
 tween the extremes of Pseudo-Fundamentalism 
 or sceptic Modernism. Either means shipwreck. 
 True faith, however, is not caught on the horns 
 of this dilemma and the hope of a distracted and 
 exhausted world is not reduced to these dread 
 alternatives. But more of this later. 
 
 SPIRITUAL PERSPECTIVE. 
 The crying need of the hour is spiritual per- 
 spective. More than all things else we need the 
 gift of that Spirit which opens our eyes to what 
 
AND MODERNISTS 43 
 
 neither physical nor mental eye hath seen (1 Cor. 
 2. 9). The physical, the material, the literal, is 
 assuredly not the only reality. As conductors of 
 spiritual truth the senses are poor indeed. To say 
 of anything material, “This is fundamental,” is 
 to deny the faith of Christ. To say that the spir- 
 itual is not real, and the far more real thing, is 
 nothing less than to train our guns, in the name 
 of the Christian faith, on the very stronghold of 
 the Christian faith. The Spirit of Christ does 
 not stop short at the surface of anything. It does 
 not deny the truth of His own mind. On the 
 contrary it makes the letter of Scripture diapha- 
 nous to a higher and a greater light and transpar- 
 ent to the deeply penetrating eye of faith. The 
 throne of God stands on ‘“‘a sea of glass like unto 
 crystal” (Rev. 4. 6). 
 
 The damage done by what one writer calls 
 “dementalized textarianism’” may not appear at 
 once, but the day is not far distant when literal 
 strictures on single texts and larger portions 
 of Scripture must cause the faith of many to 
 wax cold. Meanwhile we should feel devoutly 
 grateful for what God has preserved to us 
 of our Protestant inheritance from the days 
 of the Reformation. Eternal vigilance is still the 
 price of liberty, but as yet we do not have our 
 
44 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 views formulated for us by any curia, to find our- 
 selves shut in, like goldfish circling in a glass 
 globe, looking out into fields of divine truth 
 through walls we cannot pass. Christian scholar- 
 ship is not with us a stigma of disgrace. In the 
 cases, numerous enough, where it has deviated, 
 this is not infrequently the reaction of the instinct 
 of self-preservation against the illiberal intoler- 
 ance of the undiscerning. Where such scholarship 
 might have been inspired by a spirit of piety and 
 directed by deep devotion it is often estranged 
 by the attitude of those who seem to think that 
 their own opinion is a ne plus ultra, the final 
 word. To create Modernism by maintaining a 
 reactionary position, and then to condemn it and 
 curse it, is surely not a service well pleasing to 
 God. Such a course may indeed be in the interest 
 of a dead, formal religion, but hardly in the in- 
 terest of a vital Christianity and of the faith that 
 overcometh the world. 
 
 PROGRESSIVE REVELATION. 
 
 Is there such a thing as “progressive revela- 
 tion” in the Scriptures? The question has been 
 raised and proves to be actual. It confronts us 
 as a problem which concerns a living faith in the 
 Bible and refuses to be dismissed with a gesture. 
 
AND MODERNISTS 45 
 
 There is good reason for the contention of a 
 certain type of Fundamentalists against it. A 
 true instinct tells them that it may be a hole in 
 the dike, threatening us with a devastating in- 
 undation. If the Bible is the Word of God, why 
 is not every book, chapter, and verse of equal © 
 authority for all times? And who is to pass on | 
 the relative value of the different parts? 
 
 These Fundamentalists maintain that its con- 
 tents are all on the same level; that every part 
 is equally authoritative in its truth for our faith 
 and in its ethics for our conduct; that the New 
 Testament does not mark a higher stage of devel- 
 opment, but that Leviticus and the Gospel of John, 
 Kcclesiastes and the Apocalypse, are on exactly 
 the same plane. Is this position tenable? Is < 
 consistent application of this doctrine possible? 
 Let us take a few cases in point. 
 
 In Dt. 25. 5-10 we read, “If brethren dwell to- 
 gether, and one of them die, and have no son, the 
 wife of the dead shall not be married without unto 
 a stranger; her husband’s brother shall go in unto 
 her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the 
 duty of a husband’s brother unto her. And it 
 shall be, that the first born that she beareth shall 
 succeed in the name of his brother that is dead, 
 that his name be not blotted out of Israel. And if 
 the man like not to take his brother’s wife, then 
 
46 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 his brother’s wife shall go up to the gate unto 
 the elders, and say, My husband’s brother refus- 
 eth to raise up unto his brother a name in Israel; 
 he will not perform the duty of a husband’s broth- 
 er unto me. Then the elders of the city shall call 
 him, and speak to him; and if he stand, and say, 
 I like not to take her; then shall his brother’s wife 
 come unto him in the presence of the elders, and 
 loose his shoe off his foot, and spit in his face; 
 and she shall answer and say, So shall it be done 
 unto the man that doth not build up his brother’s 
 house. And his name shall be called in Israel, 
 The house of him that hath his shoe loosed.” Read 
 also verses 11 and 12. 
 
 The same Law commands: “If a man have a 
 stubborn and rebellious son, who will not obey 
 the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, 
 and who, when they have chastened him, will not 
 hearken unto them, then shall his father and his 
 mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto 
 the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his 
 place; and they shall say unto the elders of his 
 city. This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he 
 will not obey our voices; he is a glutton and a 
 drunkard. And all the men of the city shall stone 
 him with stones, that he die; so shalt thou put 
 evil away from among you; and all Israel shall 
 hear, and fear” (Dt. 21. 18-21). 
 
AND MODERNISTS AT 
 
 Again, when the Law stipulates that the meat 
 of an animal “that dieth of itself” may not be 
 eaten by an Israelite, but may be sold to a for- 
 eigner (Dt. 14. 21), is it not evident that its ethics 
 belong to an earlier age? 
 
 Now, these things are in the Bible. The Bible 
 says so. But who among us is ready to step forth 
 and declare that this code applies to-day just as 
 it reads. Especially in view of the doubts raised 
 by such passages in the mind of the average read- 
 er and the really serious difficulties which he en- 
 counters again and again. And when our theology 
 teaches that this legislation is fulfilled in Christ 
 and therefore no longer binding in the New Cove- 
 nant, does it not thereby admit that this part of 
 the Old Testament is superceded by a higher 
 spiritual law and in so far concede that the claims 
 of the “progressives” may be deserving of some 
 consideration? 
 
 But how about the rest of the Old Testament? 
 Take the following commands occurring in its 
 sacred history: “Thus saith the Lord God of 
 Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and 
 go in and out from the gate throughout the camp, 
 and slay every man his brother, and every man 
 his companion, and every man his neighbor” (Ex. 
 32.27). Again, “Spare them not, but slay both man 
 and woman, infant and suckling” (1 Sam. 15.38). 
 
48 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 Even the most reactionary traditionalists are 
 not ready to defend the position that such pas- 
 sages as these be applied literally to-day, or that 
 they are to be placed on a par with, for instance, 
 the words of Jesus in the Gospels. 3 
 
 Those who are acquainted with their Bibles 
 know that such illustrations might be multiplied 
 indefinitely, and in some instances with even 
 graver moral import. 
 
 The subject requires a far more careful and 
 extensive treatment than we can give it here. To 
 sum the matter up in a few statements, it should 
 be evident to every spiritual mind, that if the 
 Bible is the Word of God its inspiration must be 
 plenary. It must be replete with the divine life 
 and light which in itself knows of no progressive 
 
 development. There is no less of the Spirit of . 
 
 God in Genesis than in Matthew, no less of divine 
 truth in Exodus and Leviticus than in Mark and 
 Luke. The Holy Spirit does not “‘grow.” 
 
 But with regard to the surface meaning of the 
 letter in which that revelation is couched, the case 
 is different. The language of such passages as 
 those instanced above, that is, the historical sense, 
 is not the plane to which Christ would lift the 
 Church of the New Covenant. In other words, 
 spiritually there is no progressive revelation ; his- 
 torically there is a progressive revelation. If we 
 
 : 
 
AND MODERNISTS 49 
 
 penetrate perpendicularly, so to speak, beneath 
 the subsurface into the spirit of the Word, the 
 fulness of God’s revelation is present from the be- 
 ginning and knows of no degree. But if we look 
 at it horizontally, we can hardly fail to recognize 
 a progressive development of its human medium 
 and temporal language. There is therefore truth 
 in the contention of both the schools of theology 
 under consideration. The difference is in the 
 angle of vision. Do we then make Scripture of 
 none effect through this synthesis? God forbid; 
 nay, we establish Scripture. Meanwhile the stars 
 of God’s Word shine on, even though some of His 
 children should still believe that they are bright 
 holes in the floor of its heaven. They continue 
 to shed their divine radiance with equal impar- 
 - tiality on the path of all wayfaring men, whether 
 these pilgrims homeward-bound are journeying 
 on the quiet plains or voyaging on stormy seas. 
 No matter what our theories may be about them, 
 they are God’s creation. ‘“He made the stars also” 
 (Gen. 1. 16). 
 
 SCIENCE AND THE BIBLE. 
 
 Another inconsistency appears in the attitude 
 of the typical Pseudo-Fundamentalist toward cer- 
 tain theories of natural science. He is eminently 
 right in protesting against the gross abuse which 
 
50 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 is sometimes made of new discoveries, against a 
 materialistic trend of scientific knowledge as ap- 
 plied science, against an irreligious bias on the 
 part of many an educator, against the sapping 
 process of rationalism going on in the Church it- 
 self. And this trend is so ominous that the in- 
 clination to wholesale condemnation is well nigh 
 justifiable. ‘“‘Rather no progress at all,” the faith- 
 ful feel at times, “‘than the threatened loss of what 
 is far more precious than mere science.” 
 
 And yet history proves that indiscriminate dis- 
 carding of theories that are after all honest at- 
 tempts to account for indisputable facts is at best 
 only negatively in the interest of faith. And by 
 emphasizing unduly the negative side we are in 
 danger of inflicting fatal injury to positive truth 
 of every kind. Nor will mere invective further 
 the cause of Christ in the hearts and minds of the 
 coming generation. Such uninformed zeal is even 
 now causing serious harm to the struggling faith 
 of our youth. Many of them are battling des- 
 perately to keep their faith amid the widening 
 horizons of a new day. They are sincerely desir- 
 ous to preserve a precious inheritance while ac- 
 quiring actual knowledge. They are getting ac- 
 quainted with the facts of astronomy, biology, geo- 
 logy and history, and then suddenly presented 
 with the dread alternative, “Science, or the Bible! 
 
AND MODERNISTS 51 
 
 You cannot have both!” The consequence is that 
 mind and heart are rent asunder, and faith is 
 often wrecked beyond repair. 
 
 A far better course would be to inform our- 
 selves as far as may be; to accept tentatively such 
 facts as appear to be clearly demonstrated; to see 
 how far they can be harmonized with the Scrip- 
 tures; and then be willing to share our convictions 
 with those who need our assistance and look to 
 us for guidance over possible stumbling-blocks in 
 the path. | 
 
 We who are a little older than our children 
 should also bear in mind that after the age of 
 forty on an average we hardly ever change our 
 world-view or system of thought. Nor does the 
 wiser and better element among our young people 
 expect it. They do however expect, and they have 
 a right to expect, that we do not attempt to inflict 
 our obsolete science and medieval philosophy on 
 them, and that we refrain from abusing them for 
 entertaining diverging views in purely secular 
 matters. For they have stepped into a world as 
 different from ours as the sixteenth century was 
 different from the twelfth. But meanwhile many 
 of them are hoping and trusting that we will 
 share with them our Bible, our Saviour, our 
 Christian faith, our spiritual experience, our hope 
 of salvation. 
 
5? FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 In so far as the natural sciences taught in our 
 schools to-day tally with the facts of God’s own 
 handiwork, they cannot of course be wicked in 
 themselves. Nor can the theological science taught 
 in seminaries be wicked in itself, in so far as it 
 tallies with the facts of the Bible. We have rea- 
 son to believe that the true scientists in both fields 
 are sincere in their desire to discover and to share 
 with us nothing but the truth. In both fields how- 
 ever there are also men who are only would-be 
 scientists, with whom “‘a little learning is a dan- 
 gerous thing,” both to themselves and to others. 
 There are men whose hearts are wrong and who 
 therefore can have no true vision in the head. 
 Those who are strangers to God are unable to see 
 the truth, not only spiritual truth but truth of any 
 kind. They may know facts and yet be unable to 
 distinguish between a fact and a truth. There are 
 also teachers of the same stripe who are incapable 
 of presenting scientific facts in their relation to 
 truth in other fields of knowledge and who there- 
 fore misrepresent the former and leave pupils 
 with entirely erroneous inferences, to say nothing 
 of the relation of these facts to the truths of re- 
 vealed religion. Outside of the schools we have 
 the press and its Sunday articles which readers 
 of this material are so easily deluded into believ- 
 ing to be the final word in “science.” Much of 
 
AND MODERNISTS 53 
 
 what appears in the popular magazines and in 
 “the best sellers” is of the same misleading order. 
 
 Our real source of danger is therefore the abuse 
 ' of the facts by irresponsible men, and the half- 
 baked dough which is dished up in the name of 
 science, not infrequently poisoned besides by the 
 insinuations of sceptical minds. But also our own 
 neglect to keep pace with the changes going on be- 
 fore our eyes and our failure to give our children 
 the spiritual ballast which would keep their men- 
 tal ship on an even keel. We have been working 
 at the wrong end in the attempt to correct abuses 
 by intemperate criticism, instead of bending our 
 energies to create a spirit and a character that 
 would grapple with each problem as it arises and 
 incorporate the solution in a truly Christian phi- 
 losophy of the world. 
 
 The situation being what it is, we should be 
 grateful for the voices which are raised in warn- 
 ing against a tendency that is big with danger. In- 
 stead of permitting ourselves to be annoyed by 
 those voices, it behooves us to give respectful at- 
 tention to a spiritual instinct which is right in the 
 main, even though words employed and methods 
 adopted may not be all that we might desire. But 
 as the cure for abnormal conditions is normal 
 men, so the cure for misinformation is informed 
 men, and the cure for anti-Christianity is Chris- 
 
54 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 tian men. Only those who are informed, as well 
 as Christian, and Christian, as well as informed, 
 are “normal,” and thus in position to offer real as- 
 sistance in solving acute and distressing problems. 
 It shows the present need of intelligent, educated, 
 and spiritual-minded leadership in the Church, 
 the School, and the State. Money-bags do not 
 make good statesmen; pagans do not make good 
 teachers; and Philistines do not make good 
 churchmen. 
 
 THE NEED OF GUIDANCE. 
 
 But why discuss these matters at all? Would it 
 not be wiser to refrain entirely from ventilating 
 questions of this kind? The simple answer is, 
 There is such a thing as conscience, there is such 
 a thing as concern for souls. And when others 
 far better equipped remain silent, and souls are 
 being swept down the current before our very 
 eyes, we have no other choice but to offer our 
 services to those who will accept them. 
 
 There are young men and women by the thou- 
 sands, open, honest minds. who are emerging out 
 of the older forms of their childhood faith and 
 who therefore are in imminent danger of losing 
 that faith with the sloughing of these earlier 
 forms. These young minds are not being proper- 
 ly cared for. It is difficult to assist them in a 
 
AND MODERNISTS 55 
 
 really helpful way. Hence they are very much in 
 need of friends who understand their mental 
 problems and are willing to lend a hand. Early 
 personal experiences of similar mental difficul- 
 ties, observation at close hand of others who are 
 stumbling along on the same paths, and the dis- 
 coveries a teacher makes of the workings of the 
 adolescent mind, are our sufficient warrant for 
 rendering what we humbly trust may be of some 
 assistance in climbing through the mists to the 
 higher altitudes and wider prospects of revealed 
 truth. 
 
 A mother may weep over the doubts of her 
 growing son, a father may rave over his “‘non- 
 sense,” a companion may laugh at his scruples, 
 but the heart of the young man himself may be 
 crying out for help. Intellectual integrity is price- 
 less to him. He loathes duplicity. He refuses to 
 be an opportunist or a craven. But if some older 
 friends steps into his life and shows him how to 
 solve the intellectual problems that seem to stand 
 in the way of his faith, there is strong probability 
 that by the grace of God he will see his way clear 
 to the solution of what is after all a spiritual 
 problem. The faith of even one soul is moreover 
 so precious that if a word here and there may be 
 even only suggestive, it is worth whatever it may 
 cost in the way of experiences that sadden our 
 
56 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 mortal life. Such assistance is of course intended 
 for those who may need it. and not for those who 
 are above or beyond it. 
 
AND MODERNISTS 57 
 
 B. THE MODERNISTS. 
 
 Of these there are again several kinds. In fact, 
 there are all of the “57 varieties.”’ But once more 
 we discover a Right and a Left, and for our pres- 
 ent purposes we shall discuss them under these 
 two headings. 
 
 THE RIGHT WING. 
 
 There are men who are classed by the Pseudo- 
 Fundamentalists as Modernists and Liberalists 
 who at heart are true Fundamentalists. They 
 accept all the foundation doctrines because these 
 are a vital part of their Christian experience. In 
 their daily conduct also they manifest the spirit 
 of their Lord and Saviour. They are men of faith 
 and men of prayer. They confess Christ in word 
 and deed and walk worthily of the Gospel. Their 
 hearts are the abode of the Holy Spirit, and they 
 show a genuine concern for the salvation of their 
 fellow-men. 
 
 But while they believe sincerely in the Bible as 
 the inspired Word of God, they do not accept the 
 forbidding literalism of the Pseudo-Fundamental- 
 ist, for the simple reason that they find it incon- 
 
5S FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 sistent with a spiritual faith, as well as contrary 
 to the spirit of Scripture itself. Nor will they 
 always agree to be bound by particular theories 
 of inspiration which have no definition in the New 
 Testament and never were made tests of fellow- 
 ship in the Apostolic Church. They believe in the 
 second coming of Christ, and in the imminence of 
 that coming, but not all of them will accept as 
 obligatory for faith the manner of that coming in 
 every minute detail as laid down by those who 
 arbitrarily constitute themselves a court of last 
 appeal. They take this position, partly because 
 they have taken pains to inform themselves and 
 their integrity gives them no other choice, and 
 partly because they find the truth so discovered 
 quite consistent with the Bible’s own interpreta- 
 tion of itself. 
 
 Dr. Jowett said, shortly before his death: “I 
 yield to none in zealous guardianship and procla- 
 mation of the central and fundamental doctrines 
 of the evangelical faith, and I think there was 
 never a time when there was greater need for 
 those doctrines to be proclaimed. It is imperative 
 that we be solidly united in sacred loyalty to all 
 truth that is essential to the regeneration and 
 sanctification of the soul and the creation of men 
 and women in Christ Jesus. But it is possible to 
 so contend, even for central things, as to lose the 
 
AND MODERNISTS 59 
 
 sense of relation and proportion; and by the man- 
 ner of our controversy we may lose the clear sight 
 of the supreme values. The first necessity of all 
 vital and tenacious hold upon the evangelical ver- 
 ities, and of fruitful ministry in them, is the 
 Spirit of the Lord Jesus. It is this Spirit and this 
 alone that clarifies the atmosphere, removing the 
 confusing, obscuring medium of suspicion, mis- 
 understanding and unholy anger and resentment.” 
 
 THE LEFT WING. 
 
 But there are also Modernists of a different 
 color. These too are materialistic literalists, who 
 miss entirely the spirit of the Scriptures, but at 
 the opposite extreme of the Pseudo-Fundamental- 
 ists. For their rationalism is as much material- 
 ism in the last analysis as is the intellectualism of 
 the orthodoxist. These liberalists secularize the 
 sacred contents of Scripture. To them it is only 
 so much literature of varying value. Its divine 
 authority is practically nil. For an infallible 
 Bible and an “‘infallible’’ Pope they have substi- 
 tuted the “‘infallibility” of scientists. They speak 
 brave words about the spirit of the Scriptures, but 
 they are like the undevout astronomer who 
 claimed to have swept the heavens with his tele- 
 scope and found no God. They dissect and dis- 
 member the body of Scripture and of course the 
 
60 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 keen edge of their criticism fails to discover the 
 soul. They make a pretense of keeping such parts 
 of the Bible as seem to stand the test of natural 
 reason and theological science, but gradually even 
 these parts slip out of their grasp, like dry sand in 
 a fist. Occasionally they attempt to save a rem- 
 nant by a kind of spiritual interpretation of their 
 own, which however only vaporizes and dissipates 
 it. Almost every vital doctrine too is either open- 
 ly denied, gutted by mental reservations, or gar- 
 bled out of all semblance to the truth. “Liberalism 
 in theology is a sickish dilution of orthodoxy. 
 Fundamentalism is at least strong, even if it is 
 blind. Liberal modernism can see farther than it 
 dares to go. It is a coward at heart’ (Professor 
 Cushman). They are flippant of mind, adroit in 
 the art of camouflage, and their mental habit is 
 negation. The attitude they take toward the hum- 
 ble believer is one of cynical contempt or snobbish 
 tolerance. For the spirit of prayer and any true 
 missionary zeal we shall look in vain. “The com- 
 mand, ‘Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
 shalt be saved, thou and thy house,’ they have 
 changed to read, ‘Believe in the progress of man 
 onward and upward forever’ by a free mechanical 
 process” (Marshall Dawson). They are Pilates 
 who ask, “‘What is truth?” and then deliberately 
 turn their backs upon the Truth. Therefore they 
 
AND MODERNISTS 61 
 
 also fail to recognize the background reflection of 
 themselves in the mirror Paul holds up in 1 Cor. 
 1. 26-29, “For behold your calling, brethren, that 
 not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, 
 not many noble, are called; but God chose the 
 foolish things of the world, that he might put to 
 shame the things that are wise; and God chose he 
 weak things of the world, that he might put to 
 shame the things that are strong; and the base 
 things of the world, and the things that are de- 
 spised, did God choose, yea, and the things that 
 are not, that he might bring to nought the things 
 that are: that no flesh should glory before God.” 
 
 WHY THIS SPIRIT? 
 
 The reason for such a spirit is patent. Their 
 faith is only intellectualism. They are lacking in 
 religious experience. They are strangers to the 
 Holy Spirit. And they have nothing to substitute 
 for what they are taking away. ‘They are, in 
 short, blind leaders of the blind. 
 
 There may however be additional reasons. It 
 may be that they have been driven into the dilem- 
 ma of choosing between the reactionary attitude 
 of the Pseudo-Fundamentalists and — nothing. 
 For this is the alternative presented to many a 
 sincere and distracted mind to-day. Certainly this 
 
62 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 was not the only choice, but there is a possibility 
 that a third choice did not appear to them. 
 
 Another cause may be a church-machinery 
 Christianity, on the one hand, and an emotion- 
 revival Christianity, on the other, both of which 
 history shows go swiftly to seed in a hollow trav- 
 esty of religion. The natural fruit of the one is 
 orthodoxism and formalism, and that of the other 
 is rationalism and anomianism. The one trend 
 reappears in Pseudo-Fundamentalism; the other 
 in modern Liberalism. Both are head-religion; the 
 one looking back to the past with a closed mind; 
 the other looking forward with sightless eyes; the 
 one resting on human authority, the other build- 
 ing on the shifting sands of secular knowledge, — 
 neither one penetrating with the eyes of a living 
 faith to the heart and spirit of revealed truth, the 
 heart and spirit of Christ. 
 
 Regardless however of the causes, with or with- 
 out a name, the fact remains that if this Liberalist 
 movement comes into the ascendency and takes 
 the lead in the Church, the end is unbelief and 
 lawlessness, while it is equally true that if Pseudo- 
 Fundamentalism takes the lead, the end is paral- 
 ysis and dry-rot. In the one case, no Church at 
 all; in the other case, a mortuary chapel. Mean- 
 while we must be on our guard lest the Church 
 invite an attitude of indifference, or at best be 
 
AND MODERNISTS 63 
 
 regarded with tolerance and patronage, as though 
 she were ‘‘a sort of institutional grandmother, 
 worthy of affection and care, but not capable of 
 functioning in a vigorous and vital way. Religion 
 is absolute and imperial in its very genius. It 
 cannot be dependent. Its royalty and universal- 
 ity are inherent. When they go, it ceases to live.” 
 
 According to present indications Sadduceeism 
 and Pharisaism will continue to exist for awhile 
 side by side, growing ever more hostile and bitter 
 toward each other. In the end, however, history 
 will repeat itself, first in a combined attack on 
 the Spirit of the Christ “without the camp” of 
 both factions, and then in the fury of a mutual 
 war that shall undermine the resistance of the 
 organized Church and usher in another and still 
 more fearful “destruction of Jerusalem.” 
 
 THE SOLUTION. 
 
 This “destruction” may be the final “solution,” 
 heralding the coming of the King and His King- 
 dom. Prophecy looks in this direction and out- 
 lines such a consummation. Any other solution 
 may therefore be nothing short of unbelief flying 
 in the face of God. But in the event that some 
 of us may not be reading the signs of the times 
 aright, other solutions may deserve at least a 
 passing consideration. 
 
64. FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 One proposed solution is to combine Pseudo- 
 Fundamentalism and Pseudo-Modernism in a com- 
 plete and balanced whole. A little acquaintance 
 with the spirit of each will show that the pros- 
 pects of such a possibility are nothing short of 
 hopeless. The inherent incompatibility of the two > 
 is that of cil and water. A reconciliation between 
 these extremists would involve the surrender of 
 principles which both regard as essential. The 
 differences are nothing less than opposing views 
 of life. A liberal organ, ‘‘The Christian Century,” 
 says that the issue “‘goes to the very roots of reli- 
 gious conviction and involves the basic purpose 
 and almost the genius of Christianity itself. The 
 differences are not mere surface differences, but 
 are foundation differences, structural differences, 
 amounting in their radical dissimilarity almost to 
 the differences between two distinct religions.” 
 
 The public debates which are being held by 
 representatives of the opposing camps are suffi- 
 cient evidence of this. The heart grows sick with 
 misgivings when we pick up a morning paper and 
 read the scare headline, ‘‘Bible Not Inspired,” 
 even though we know that the debate was not on 
 the question of its inspiration at all, but on differ- 
 ing theories of Inspiration. Such discussions only 
 make the issue sharper and bring the schism 
 nearer — which indeed, from a higher point of 
 
AND MODERNISTS 65 
 
 view, may be highly desirable. For in spite of all 
 amenities these “mills” are no academic conver- 
 sations, but a fight to the finish. And no matter 
 who “wins,” his victory is a defeat for both, 
 especially as neither side has a fair opportunity 
 to emphasize essentials that both may be supposed 
 to have in common, but must use the limited time 
 in antagonizing each other and in exposing the 
 glaring mistakes of the opposition. 
 
 The general public too is growing weary of the 
 contention. While they may not appreciate the 
 issues involved, they do feel that “it is not the 
 fault of one that two quarrel.” They feel that the 
 strife is entirely aside of the point as far as their 
 true interests are concerned. It does not feed 
 their souls, and it does not guide their feet into 
 the way of peace, nor does it marshal the hosts 
 of Christ to fight the common enemy. There may 
 be those who enjoy the spectacle of a religious 
 prize-fight, but there are also souls who turn away 
 from such a scene with horror. The former are 
 the yelling rooters of both factions; the latter 
 are the disciples of Him who says, ‘“‘Let the tares 
 grow with the wheat until the harvest.” Both 
 should be old enough to know that neither seven- 
 teenth century orthodoxism nor eighteenth cen- 
 tury “Enlightenment” will save us. A larger num- 
 ber among “the remnant” than many of us sup- 
 
66 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 pose are even beginning to ask in all seriousness, 
 “Is the time at hand for the simple followers of 
 Christ to go forth and become a ‘church in the 
 _ wilderness’ ?” 
 
 A second proposition is to steer clear of both 
 Right and Left in each camp, avoid the pitfalls — 
 on either side, and walk serenely neutral in the 
 middle of the road. But this too is impossible. 
 For both of the larger groups, no matter how 
 much they differ in manner of approach, do har- 
 bor certain essentials that are indispensable to a 
 complete and properly functioning Christianity. 
 That is, the Fundamentalists have the content of 
 faith, even though it sometimes be in the form of 
 a cyst, and without this content Modernism is 
 only so much vapor. The Modernists, again, rep- 
 resent the shift in the center of gravity which has 
 taken place in the modern Renaissance of natural, 
 philosophical, and theological science, and which 
 offers forms in which the old faith must be re- 
 stated in order to become a reviving power in a 
 disintegrating world. 
 
 In a similar vein a representative of Modern- 
 ism, Dr. R. C. Smith, says, ‘““The reason why we 
 find ourselves on different sides is because fifty 
 years ago the Bible began to be examined crit- 
 ically, to see how it was made and to find out 
 what it really said. This Bible, as we have seen, 
 
AND MODERNISTS 67 
 
 means everything; it is the record of the revela- 
 tion of Jesus Christ, upon. whom the hope of the 
 world depends. The Fundamentalist said: ‘You 
 can not touch it. Leave it alone. You critics are 
 going to destroy our Bible and the faith of good 
 people. Do away with its authority, and you kill 
 hope.’ 
 
 “Now the Fundamentalists are right in saying 
 that no hands shall hurt the Book where millions 
 of men find life; they are right in saying that the 
 men who examine it shall not destroy it. But 
 the Modernist answers the Fundamentalist and 
 says: ‘We have such faith in the light and life 
 and spirit that we have found within the Bible 
 that nothing can destroy it. Let us find out all 
 about it; how it was written in the blood of men 
 and in the blood of Jesus Christ; let us strike 
 down deep to the authority of the spirit of the 
 Book.’ And the Modernist also claims that his 
 willingness to examine the Bible critically has 
 been vindicated; for the men who have examined 
 it have shown it to be a greater book than men 
 dreamed of, with more authority than it ever had 
 before. The discussion is not between a body of 
 men who uphold the faith of the Church and an- 
 other body of men who would undermine it or 
 who would ‘whittle down the creed to fit a dwin- 
 dling faith’; it is between loyal men on beth sides 
 
68 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 who want the Church to do its largest work in 
 the best way.” We recognize the phraseology of 
 the Modernist; and still his words may be deserv- 
 ing of some consideration as indicating an occa- 
 sional tone and temper in the movement. 
 
 Those who can approach each other in the man- - 
 ner indicated will find that the Christians in the 
 two camps no more represent two religions than 
 the two ends of a stick constitute two sticks. 
 They will also find that the truth in both will 
 blend into one, because frequently it is the same 
 truth looked at from different angles. It is true 
 that the two factions travel different roads which 
 do not converge. But to say that they have noth- 
 ing in common and that there are not elements 
 in each which could and should be combined, is 
 to take a superficial view. The mental attitude 
 of the extremists is sharply antagonistic, but deep 
 down in the soul of both there is often, if we care 
 to look for it, a real unanimity of purpose. To 
 be sure, the differences are by no means super- 
 ficial; but careful and unbiased examination will 
 show that many of the differences belong rather 
 to the sphere of theology than to essential Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 Certainly it is difficult to make clear distinc- 
 tions here. The very attempt may seem like 
 obliterating distinctions, or like a side-step to 
 
AND MODERNISTS 69 
 
 avoid or befuddle the issues. But the fact remains 
 that the degrees of difference are so numerous, 
 and so extensive, that there is not the easy cleav- 
 age which we should like to find, or use our axes 
 to make. The real dividing line is the regenerate 
 heart rather than any intellectual test or doctrinal 
 touch-stone. The separating Judge is the Spirit 
 of Christ. But for this very reason it is not so 
 impossible as it would seem for kindred souls 
 with a common Christian experience to compare 
 notes, make mutual contributions, supply deficien- 
 cies, join forces in defense of what shall appear 
 to be the truth, and unite efforts in serving the 
 real cause of the one and the same Saviour. 
 
 A third solution is therefore, not neither, nor 
 either-or, nor all of both, but some of each in a 
 new creation of God which He alone can organize 
 and inspire by His Holy Spirit. A soul is seeking 
 a body, and a body is seeking a soul. Funda- 
 mentalism of the genuine kind affords the soul, 
 and Liberalism of the corresponding kind offers 
 the material of a body. This means that to some 
 extent the former may lack an adequate organic 
 medium for touching, influencing, and directing 
 a new generation in a new world. It means also 
 that the latter may have lost its soul and is in 
 need of the spiritual regeneration which alone can 
 convert a pagan into a Christian. 
 
70 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 It may indeed be that this is not possible on the 
 hither side of the consummation of the age. The 
 time, we repeat, may not be at hand for a solution 
 even of the third kind. A cataclysm may be in- 
 evitable. It may be necessary that we first suffer | 
 shipwreck in our proud self-confidence, in order 
 that faith may experience a complete translation 
 from the temporal things which are seen to the 
 eternal things which are not seen. It may be that 
 once more God has ‘‘judged” the past, to make 
 room for a new age. 
 
 Nevertheless it must remain true that some 
 higher synthesis is both possible and desirable. 
 In fact, such a synthesis is absolutely necessary. 
 To men of vision it is growing ever clearer that 
 without a new form and a new spirit in that form 
 the prospect is a catastrophe which can end only 
 in the “blackness of darkness.” It may be that 
 Fundamentalism is impotent, and that Modern- 
 ism is barren. It may be that a senile Church is 
 now “well stricken in years.” But there is a God 
 in heaven who is able to redeem His promises. 
 The days of His miracles are not past. While 
 possessing our souls in patience it is the plain 
 duty of both leaders and followers in each of 
 these movements to inform themselves, particu- 
 larly in the fields where each is least acquainted. 
 A prejudice that fights shy of possible facts for 
 
AND MODERNISTS Tt 
 
 fear that these may upset traditional views and 
 disturb our mental equilibrium should give place 
 to honest research, in the full assurance that truth 
 is not the enemy of truth. Shutting our eyes and 
 screaming at what we do not understand is not 
 good generalship. Nor is it a convincing confes- 
 sion of faith. Luther dared to face the facts of 
 criticism because of the strength of his faith in 
 the Bible itself. And neither he nor we have 
 suffered in consequence. Those of us to whom 
 truth must be taught by others, because not much 
 truth will ever be revealed to us, must keep our 
 minds open to accept truth from whatever source 
 it may come, so long as it appeals to our intelli- 
 gence, our Christian experience, a live conscience, 
 and a faith illumined by the Word of God. Deny- 
 ing the facts or the inference of the facts does 
 not establish us in the faith. It only establishes 
 us in our own traditional opinions and views. 
 
 PRESENT NEEDS. 
 
 It would be most salutary to real progress if the 
 respective contenders would arrive at a mutual 
 understanding of definitions and terms. So much 
 of our misunderstanding is due simply to a 
 lamentably loose use of words and phrases. And 
 here the Modernists are most at fault. Certainly 
 words often take the place of ideas with the Fun- 
 
72 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 damentalists. But even more frequently the Mod- 
 ernists employ expressions which they know do 
 not truly convey their own views. 
 
 Mutual intercession for each other, not forget- 
 ting to pray for ourselves, that Christ would shed 
 abroad upon us a larger measure of His Spirit, 
 would more than all things else pave the way for 
 an approximation of enlightened Fundamental- 
 ists and believing Progressives, with material 
 benefit to both. The Pseudo-Fundamentalists in- 
 deed call their own spirit the Holy Spirit, but this 
 is not the answer to the prayer we have in mind. 
 And the false Modernists either do not pray at 
 all, or are not able to receive “the promise of the 
 Father,” because they are strangers to a saving 
 faith. 
 
 The Spirit of Christ breathes upon us a spirit 
 of humility and a spirit of love. It is the Spirit 
 that inspired such words as these, “Every one 
 who is angry with his brother shall be in danger 
 of the judgment; and whosoever shall say to his 
 brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council; 
 and whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in 
 danger of the hell of fire’ (Mt. 5. 22). “By this 
 shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye 
 have love one to another” (Jn. 18. 35). The Bap- 
 tist Convention at Atlantic City adopted as its 
 motto, “Agreed to Differ but Resolved to Love.” 
 
AND MODERNISTS | 73 
 
 We all need the reminder that prophecy, knowl- 
 edge, impoverishing ourselves for the poor, and 
 martyrdom itself, are all as nothing without love 
 (1 Cor. 18. 1-8). . 
 
 That same Spirit also makes us free and 
 prompts us to respect the freedom of the brother. 
 “For freedom did Christ set us free; stand fast 
 therefore, and be not entangled again in the yoke 
 of bondage” (Gal. 5. 1), whether it be, as here, 
 the yoke of the law, or the yoke of Pharisaism, 
 or the yoke of Sadduceeism. No spiritual fruit 
 was ever produced by coercion. To bind the brain 
 and gag the mouth is to render static the intel- 
 lectual life and faith of all, pastors and teachers 
 included. It leads to pretense and crawfishing 
 and to a general cowardice in thinking and ex- 
 pression because of which men are afraid to give 
 the hot truth straight from their hearts. It makes 
 them inhibit their honest convictions, to look 
 around instead for some canned article with a 
 special label to commend it. 
 
 This was not the attitude of the prophets, the 
 apostles, the reformers, and it should not be the 
 spirit of the Church which has been the Church 
 of education and knowledge, of freedom of speech 
 and conscience, of faith and love. It is to be hoped 
 that this Church will continue to prove strong 
 enough to include, as does the Bible itself, various 
 
74 3 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 types of personality and various modes of think- 
 ing, and not be a one-track affair which excludes 
 all minds that do not run in a single groove. To. 
 stand still is to go to seed. If the Spirit of Christ 
 is our motive power we may safely leave the 
 direction to Him. It will not serve the purpose 
 to-day to make of the church “a limousine which 
 we decorate with a bouquet of cut-flowers, when 
 the batteries are dead.” 
 
 With respect to human authority we do not he- 
 lieve in gravitation because of Newton, nor do we 
 accept the atomic theory because of Dalton, nor 
 the X-ray because of Roentgen, nor the facts of 
 radium because of the Curies. We accept them be- 
 cause they “work” and because they serve, or can 
 be made to serve, the interests of mankind. The 
 spirit which would drive pastors out of pulpits 
 and professors out of their chairs because of 
 purely scientific views and their inescapable in- 
 ferences is a piece of conceit and affrontery so 
 astounding in our age that fair-minded men turn 
 away with a feeling of humiliation and shame. 
 To taunt progressive men to pick up and leave if 
 the fulminations of reactionaries do not please 
 them is to confuse the identity of the Church or 
 of their own particular denomination with the 
 identity of their own group. This spirit is of one 
 piece with that of the hundred-per cent patriot- 
 
AND MODERNISTS 75 
 
 eers who tell political progressives that if they do 
 not like a Teapot Dome government they are at 
 liberty to leave the country. It is the spirit of the 
 reactionary king Louis XIV who said (rendered 
 in the vernacular): ‘“‘The State, that’s me.” This 
 was the spirit and attitude moreover that brought 
 on the Revolution. | 
 
 Over against this presumption “The Lutheran” 
 strikes a sane note: “‘Many sects have held fast 
 to little points on the circumference of the Chris- 
 tian faith and have lost their hold on the great 
 center of Gospel truth. There is need of much 
 earnest searching of Scripture to learn afresh 
 what is clearly revealed. There is need of cast- 
 ing overboard half-truths based on a few pet 
 passages of Scripture to the exclusion of what 
 other passages have to say. The evangelicals 
 must not be indifferent to history and scholarship, 
 but must become masters in this field. They must 
 establish their claim as defenders of the Gospel 
 on more solid ground than sentiment and fervor, 
 and show that they are not averse to growth and 
 progress in sacred knowledge. Here is a case 
 where there can be no real peace until the issue 
 is clearly faced and met.” 
 
76 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 What we have attempted to say in the preced- — 
 ing pages — pleading for our diffusion the nebu- 
 lous nature of the subject — serves to show, if 
 no more, that the question is still an open one and 
 by no means presents the alternative of either 
 Pharisaism or Sadduceeism. If this dread alter- 
 native were all that is left to us, the author for 
 one would have to be counted with those who 
 after all have preserved the essentials ‘of the true 
 faith, even though some of these essentials appear 
 to be hidden away under the soil of a well-kept 
 cemetery. In our presentation, however, we have 
 deliberately leaned in the other direction, but only 
 in an instinctive move to recover the balance of 
 the boat in which we are voyaging. For it cannot 
 be denied that the craft has taken a rather serious 
 list to port. 
 
 In the language of another figure, the really 
 important thing is the home; but there can surely 
 be no harm in adding some ‘‘modern improve- 
 ments” to the house. Nor need the family life be 
 disrupted if the younger members should choose 
 to use a different language from that of their 
 parents. That is to say, if a new generation in 
 the Church should employ a modern tongue in ex- 
 pressing the same old saving truths of the past. 
 
AND MODERNISTS i § 
 
 As the language question has at times caused 
 serious dissension in local congregations, so a cor- 
 responding change in the language of theology 
 may prove to be provocative of contention. There 
 is, however, no good reason why it should produce 
 a split in the household of faith. Against such a 
 possibility we of course must contend, not with 
 a “zeal that is not according to knowledge,” but 
 yet with all the ardor of the Spirit of Christ. If 
 we hold to the essentials, though language may 
 vary, and make our theology Biblio-centric and 
 Christo-centric, there is little danger of the ec- 
 centricity which would “fly off at a tangent’ in 
 either of the opposite directions. And the con- 
 servation of such conservatism will find its key- 
 note in the confession of Paul: “The life which 
 I now live in the flesh I live in faith, the faith 
 which is in the Son of God, who loved me, and 
 gave himself up for me” (Gal. 2. 20). 
 
 We are not committed to the impossible choice 
 between Pseudo-Fundamentalism and naturalistic 
 Modernism. Something very different from both 
 is certain to emerge out of the present strife and 
 confusion. Unless indeed the clash marks the end 
 of the age. And even so, history would indicate 
 that the close of one zon signalizes the beginning 
 of a new zon. As in the past, converging lines 
 of development point to the rise of a new grour 
 
78 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 of “disciples” consisting of Fundamentalists in 
 the true sense of the term,—those who have 
 experienced the essential truths of the Christian 
 religion in their own lives, but who also have rec- 
 ognized the formal truths of new discoveries in 
 the visible universe of God and above all in the 
 still greater universe of His revelation. These 
 are the souls who will give heed to Conservatives 
 and Progressives alike, because they realize that, 
 for the very conservation of its life, to say noth- 
 ing of its progress, the Church must have not 
 only ecclesiastical “‘priests” of the past but also 
 spiritual “prophets” of the future. 
 
 This group has not come to the fore as yet. 
 They are still scattered in a Dispersion. They 
 are still waiting for the “‘pentecost”’ that shall 
 unite them into a vitally organic body. “Yet the 
 vision is for many days.” Its realization, how- 
 ever, is the hope of a distracted world. Mean- 
 while we rest assured that the providence of God 
 is perfect and that His promises will not fail. 
 
 “Around our incompleteness, His completeness; 
 Around our restlessness, His rest.” 
 
 We may live to see that “even the youths shall 
 faint and be weary, and the young men shall ut- 
 terly fall,” but also that “they that wait for 
 Jehovah shall renew their strength; they shall 
 
AND MODERNISTS 79 
 
 mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, 
 and not be weary; they shall walk-and not faint” 
 (Is. 40. 30, 31). 
 
 To employ once more an old but serviceable 
 figure, Fundamentalism may be said to represent 
 the protecting covering of an acorn that is to fall . 
 into the ground and die; Modernism represents 
 the frosts which in the providence of God shall 
 erack the shell, release the hidden germ of truth, 
 and make possible the resurrection of its inhering 
 life. The Word of God will supply the nourishing 
 soil; the warm rains of His Spirit will provide 
 the moisture and sap; the Sun of Righteousness 
 will quicken the kernel and cause it to sprout; and 
 in the fulness of the time the branches of a tower- 
 ing tree will bear the leaves that are for the 
 healing of the nations. In that day the Church 
 of God “shall be like a tree planted by the streams 
 of water, that bringeth forth its fruit in its sea- 
 son, whose leaf also doth not wither; and what- 
 soever he (it) doeth shall prosper” (Ps. 1. 3). 
 
 Glancing back over the traveled road we are 
 reminded of a familiar fable, which may serve as 
 our summary and terminus: 
 
 A blind man, large of body and strong of limb, 
 was groping his uncertain way along a country 
 road to a distant village. A small cripple had 
 
80 FUNDAMENTALISTS 
 
 essayed the same journey earlier in the day, but 
 his strength had failed him and he was sitting by 
 the roadside in despair of ever arriving at his 
 destination. Catching sight of the blind man he 
 hailed him and told of his predicament. The re- 
 sult of the conference was a proposition by the 
 blind man to carry the cripple, with the under- 
 standing that the latter direct the way. The offer 
 was gratefully accepted, and in due course of time 
 the combination came swinging into town, the 
 cripple astride the shoulders of the blind man, the 
 strength of the one and the eyes of the other serv- 
 ing for both. 
 
 “Have ye understood all these things? They say unto 
 him, Yea. And he said unto them, Therefore every scribe, 
 who has been enrolled as a disciple in the kingdom of the 
 heavens and instructed as such, is like unto the master of a 
 household, who bringeth out of his stores things both new 
 and old” (Mt. 13. 51, 52). 
 
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