lous birth, resurrection, and ascension, the doctrine of devils, nay miracle generally, was no less sceptical and unscrupulous than that of Strauss; not to mention that by appealing almost exclusively to the spiritual or ideal Christ, St. Paul himself had long ago disparaged those external circumstances of the life of Jesus in which he had no personal share, and had gone far to countenance that "docetic" interpretation of his character1 which was a virtual denial of them. But Schleiermacher's view was formed in the seeming interests of pietism, and shrouded in the mystical reserve of Bible phraseology; whereas Strauss committed the inexpiable offence of honestly and clearly revealing the true state of the problem. His real crime was plain speaking; the unreserved and unequivocal expression of all that others had either from want of consistency or of courage suppressed or disguised. And the impression was all the more exquisitely painful and provoking for the very reason that the disclosure was in fact not novel; because it was only the consistent continuation of a theory already in a certain measure recognised by theologians; because at the very moment of an ostentatious revival of ecclesiastical prudery the importunate critic unseasonably disclosed the real tendencies and surmises of an intensely incredulous but hypocritical age, and discarding the customary affected air of pious mystery, unveiled the whole truth with the most perfect mastery of the materials, and consummate skill in exposition. He in fact displayed before the Christian mind all that it secretly apprehended but feared to acknowledge, and the age stood aghast at the too faithful reflection of its own image. As Strauss says himself at the commencement of the "Glaubenslehre," the halcyon days were over when the dream of a definitive reconciliation between theology and philosophy could be cherished; when 1 See the expression in Romans viii. 3: ὁμοιωμα σαρκος ἁμαρτίας. Hence to the docetic description (Philip. ii. 8) there is but a step. Compare Baur's Paulus, p. 463. the wolf was to lie down with the lamb, the panther with the kid. Henceforth a "Christian philosopher" was a monstrosity; Jesuitical evasion appeared no longer possible. It seemed no more within any one's power to blend the advantages of light with the wages of iniquity, to be at the same time a scientific enquirer and a sound churchman. The mirage of "accommodation" vanished, the flattering illusion as to the possibility of a compromise was suddenly dispelled. Formerly Socinians, Arminians, Quakers, etc., had all to a certain extent dealt freely with religion; but though many a hair had been pulled from the tail of the ecclesiastical steed by rationalizing divines, a decent stump of orthodoxy sufficient to maintain a respectable position in the eyes of the world had always been allowed to remain. It was truly pleasant to indulge in the luxury of a little freedom; but it was intolerable to confront the consequences of a frank and full confession. To those unacquainted with the extent and endurance of popular credulity, even to those who, though in habitual communication with the public mind, were hardly, even under these favouring circumstances, aware how eagerly men hug deception, how readily they submit to any paltry subterfuge rather than take the trouble to think, and assume the responsibility of rational beings, it seemed that a crisis was come, that the time for evasion was over, and that there remained only the bitter alternative of confessing participation in the accursed thing by approving and following the outspoken critic, or of surrendering every pretence of free investigation. The easier and safer expedient was that generally adopted. Reinvigorated ecclesiasticism bestirred itself to do battle on behalf of the invaded sanctuary; the intrepid objector was coughed down, preached against, ignored; and, as in a recent instance in England,' the best passport to official favour 1 A distinguished English prelate is said to have substituted for every other test of qualification for Holy Orders the simple question: "Do you repudiate 'Essays and Reviews?'" and influence was a strenuous repudiation of Strauss. "The Book," says an English controversialist,1 "is scarcely known in our language; the booksellers won't have it; the good sense of the public rejects it." As if, without any acquaintance with the obnoxious book, the public could exercise any real discretion on the subject ;-as if the clergy, after keeping the public mind in ignorance by garbling and suppressing the evidence, were competent to quote that very ignorance in proof of a deliberate repudiation! But the virulence of attack only revealed the extent of latent sympathy, and Strauss may well boast not only that his book remains materially unrefuted, but that for the last twenty-five years since its publication no important work on theology has appeared without exhibiting unquestionable traces of its influence. Issue of the Controversy. It may seem superfluous to advert more particularly to the many sorry expedients which have been resorted to in order to misrepresent Strauss; and yet it is absolutely necessary to have a clear conception of the issue of the controversy which modern apologists have been disposed. to treat as decisive of their cause. "The same advantage," says Dr. W. H. Mill,3" which a physician obtains by a disease coming to a crisis, is derived to the defender of the Christian cause from the unsparing (i.e. honest and unprevaricating) method of Strauss." "If miracles be impossible," says Dr. Mansel (Aids to Faith, p. 6), " the benefits. obtained by Christ's cross and passion are no longer the objects of Christian faith and hope; if He professed to work miracles, and wrought them not, what warrant have we for the trustworthiness of his other teaching?" 1 Dr. W. H. Mill, Christian Advocate at Cambridge. On Mythical Interpretation, p. 2. The declared object of Strauss is to analyze and criticise the narrative contents of the New Testament; to expose its internal self-contradictions, and the far-fetched ineffectual attempts of would-be "Harmonists" to explain or conceal them. But his adversaries, shrinking from the main question, adroitly shift the argument to an issue more promising to themselves. In a distinct and somewhat irrelevant appendix Strauss had endeavoured to allay pious anxieties by shewing that, in spite of criticism, the heart of Christianity is untouched; that after dismissing the supposed history, there still remains a substratum of ideal truth sufficient to indemnify the feelings and satisfy religion. For this purpose he enumerated the various theoretical constructions of Christianity successively resorted to by modern philosophical exegesis, ending with the speculative "Christology" of Hegel ;-according to which the union of the human and divine natures, mythically ascribed to a single individual, is asserted literally and truly in regard to humanity at large. This afforded an opportunity for disingenuous opponents, who, unable to face the critic, thought to gain an easy victory by pressing the attack against the speculative Hegelian. "It is far more," says Dr. Mill (p. 11), "from a desire of working out on an historical ground the philosophical principles of his master, than from any attachment to mythical theory,-that we are to deduce the destructive process applied by Strauss to the life of Jesus. The spirit of the desired conclusion pervades all the earlier parts of the work. The freedom from prepossession boasted by the author only indicates the substitution of a new prepossession for the old and most probably legitimate one, by which the divinely imposed laws of man's nature require him to be governed;-and is nothing more than a determination to make all considerations of reverence for older authority to yield to the application of the Hegelian metaphysics which he considers as established truth." How little this insinuation really agrees with the general drift of the "Leben Jesu" will be self-evident to every impartial reader; and the artifice recalls the trick by which Sheridan once contrived to elude an importunate equestrian creditor by an unexpected attack on his weak side: "A fine spirited nag that of yours; pray let me see his paces;" when the compliance of the applicant of course gave the ingenious defaulter the opportunity of escape. But what is the "new prepossession" really meant? It cannot be the special Hegelian rendering of the dogmatic import of the life of Jesus, for this is little more than a collateral illustration or appendix to the main subject of Strauss' work, and in his "Glaubenslehre" the author repeatedly makes this very matter the subject of distinct animadversion, deriding those fantastic transformations or allegorical constructions of dogma by which speculative philosophy had often appeared to reinstate what in fact it only more emphatically overrode and obliterated.1 In all inductive reasoning negative instances are far more important and influential than affirmative; and it was especially the negations, here making the substance of the argument, which courted and challenged refutation. Strauss of course had an undoubted right to digress, to offer, if he chose, philosophical constructions of what he held to be the Christian idea; but he might be wrong in the particular construction suggested without any injury to his main argument; he might be wrong too in injudiciously providing by such problematical suggestions an easy opportunity for cavillers to evade the real question. Hermeneutics naturally follow criticism. When told that a given narrative of unquestioned importance is primarily unhistorical, we naturally proceed to ask its real character and import. And if, under cover of a philosophical rendering of ancient symbols really implying their literal irrelevancy or untruthfulness, the answer leads some in 1 Glaubenslehre, vol. i. pp. 66, 351, and ii. p. 193. |