Ideas

The Church And The Race Problem

The Church And The Race Problem

The human predicament involves all the races in insecurity. Trouble and turmoil, hostility and hate, are wide as the human race, and not a matter merely of dramatic sectional clashes between the white man and the American Negro, or between Israeli and Arab. The real human predicament, of course, is mankind’s condition in sin, and the universal need of redemption. A Christian view of the race problem must begin with this confession of wholesale racial rebellion and guilt. No man loves God and no man loves his neighbor as he ought. The fall has cheapened human worth; redemption restores man’s dignity. Jesus’ stress on the universal need of regeneration speaks to our own turbulent times: “Ye must be born again.” The possibilities of fallen human nature are fancifully romanticized by those who expect a full solution of the race problem while they neglect this dimension of life.

Every man is somebody’s neighbor, and God expects neighbor-love from every human being. Let no man think, because he has overcome some prevalent antipathy for Jew or Negro or some other victim of sectional feelings that merely on that account he has fulfilled the moral law. A white man may crusade for civil rights; he may sell his property to a buyer of another race; he may encourage social intermingling of all races—but he does not simply on this account fulfill the law of love. What passes for desegregation and even for integration, is often quite hollow alongside the biblical injunction of love for neighbor. The race problem dare not be detached, therefore, from the abiding requirement of Christian love.

It is a sad fact, however, that some circles recite these themes of the new birth and love of neighbor, yet do not actively promote the elimination of racial evils. They often fall below the lesser level of concern reflected by secular agencies that recognize race prejudice to be one of the ugly scars in American life.

Some observers today would add to Christian confession a pledge to desist from race prejudice as evidence of the genuineness of conversion. Why not a pledge against intoxicating liquors also? The liquor traffic is a serious social blight, blemishing every village in the land. And why not a pledge against driving in excess of the speed limit? Too many church folk, ministers included, leave their guardian angels ten or fifteen miles an hour behind them on the road.

The risk in all such proposals is in their tendency to shrivel the law of neighbor-love when Christian ethics is called on to sensitize in its fullness. Yet, while we do well to overlook such proposals, the Christian conscience had best face squarely the sins they aim to correct. For in each age and in every land the violation of Christian love falls into certain conspicuous patterns. And race discrimination is especially subtle. It is not externally measurable in the same way that sins of the flesh are: it cannot be gauged by jiggers or by speedometers. Race feeling is essentially a matter of false pride, an internal disposition to deny a fellow human’s equal worth and one’s own unworthiness also, before God. Nonetheless, it differs in degree, and not in kind, from other violations of the law of love for neighbor, which involves every area of life.

Evangelical and liberal churches alike are uncomfortable in the presence of the fact that segregation was not sharpened as an issue of social conscience in America through the preaching of the churches as firmly as through the secular ruling of the Supreme Court. The churches were not, of course, called on as churches to ajudicate all the delicate problems touching education and other spheres not directly answerable to church authority. But, as citizens, church members held a voice in civic affairs; if the Christian conscience was to find a mouthpiece, it was through them.

Christians are obliged to uphold the law of the land, unless they can show that law to be in conflict with Scripture. The Christian is called upon, therefore, not only to implement the spiritual rights of men, as equals in God’s sight, but their legal rights as well.

There is little comfort for the churches in the added fact that secular agencies like the military program, telecasting and sporting events have contributed as dramatically to desegregation as have many churches. Developments in the military and in the worlds of television and sports are more widely publicized, of course, than the hushed and reverent atmosphere of the churches. In entertainment and recreation, moreover, special competitive considerations of talent are operative, involving only a small and strategic segment of the population. Integration, even on the sports level, is not achieved merely by the assignment of team positions without regard to color, gainful though it be to end racial bias in such assignments. Nor is “integrated entertainment” achieved—at least on the level of genuine love for neighbor—because Negro and white voices are blended in the latest musical jive, and some white crooner slips his undisciplined arm tightly around a Negro female guest on television. Such demonstrations can involve as much a perversion of propriety when the races are mixed as when they are not. Even when due credit is given the military, the theatre and the arena for a measure of contribution, they have much to learn about a biblical concept of Christian love.

Nonetheless, churches in America surrendered something of their moral initiative in the life of the nation when they allowed other forces, in a partial and secular way, to implement the correction of one of the striking social wrongs. Granted we must not attach utopian expectations to the society of the redeemed in history; the Church, at best, travels the road of sanctification in this life, not glorification. This present age has much to learn about the subtleties of original sin, even from theologians whose expositions do not always go to the depths of biblical theology. But, in our day, the Church has more reason to fear a lack of moral insight and courage than an excessive moral achievement.

There are wrongs in the land, and the church had best be the Church, and cry against them; there is no biblical mandate to preserve the shaggy status quo. Community tolerance of violence; forced segregation in public transportation; tactics of fear and intimidation; snobbishness that looks down upon Negro Christians virtually as inferior believers; the indifference to discrimination against the Negro in America even by some churches calling for missionaries to lift the life and culture of the dark-skinned natives of Africa—these factors suggest the deep need for soul-searching and repentance in the churches.

The Church needs to recover the biblical point of view. The Church itself was born in the glory of a multi-tongued and multi-colored Pentecost. It moved swiftly to make Christian brotherhood a reality in the experience of the inhabitants of Africa and Europe, no less than of Asia and the Near East. It did not preoccupy itself with the adoption of strategically worded resolutions at the top level of councils and conventions; it put Christian love to work at the local level. The early Church unleashed a flood of kindness in a world of racial strife; the modern Church has too often unleashed a flood of resolutions.

This same biblical point of view, moreover, will keep the churches from falling into unrealistic and faulty programs of action. For instance, one misguided Christian spokesman recently told young people that the biggest contribution a white girl can make to the advancement of Christianity in our generation is to marry a Negro. But if interracial wedlock best preserves the biblical concern for equal yoking, the essence of Christian marriage in the mid-twentieth century has deteriorated sadly. Nobody will prevent the clergy from giving their own children in marriage across racial lines, if such is their ideal, but many Christian leaders will remain unconvinced that a universally valid rule has been enunciated. The early Church hardly made racial intermarriage the test of Christian love, nor dare we.

In its enthusiasm to do something vital, the Church falls easy prey to secular and socializing programs. It has no mandate to legislate upon the world a program of legal requirements in the name of the Church. Nor dare it disregard the existence of social rights in which the natural preferences of individuals may be expressed without compromising the legal or spiritual rights of others. Forced integration is as contrary to Christian principles as is forced segregation. The reliance on pressure rather than on persuasion has resulted in a marked increase of racial tensions in some areas. Christianity ideally moves upon the life of the community by spiritual means; the secular agencies, on the other hand, tend to resort to force, with the result that their achievements are continually endangered. Paul did not outlaw slavery legally, but he outlawed it spiritually; he sent Onesimus back to Philemon as a brother in Christ. He knew that the Church’s weapons are spiritual, not carnal; that Christian progress is not revolutionary but regenerative. And a recovery of the imperative affectionate neighbor relations, and of the Holy Spirit as the dynamic of Christian living, is still the best—and the only durable—hope for a firm solution of the race problem.

While some churches seem determined to continue with a program excluding other races, and others are thrown into internal tensions between member and member, and member and minister, still others, without fanfare and headlines, have long welcomed all converts to Christ with equal dignity and rights as members of the body of Christ. Any church should be open to believers of any race. Forced segregation, however, involves the abrogation of a citizen’s legal rights as well as his spiritual rights.

The Church by a true example of the equality of all believers may rebuke the conscience of the world. The fellowship of believers still holds a power to vitalize the fellowship of the community at large. What has compromised this power is the secularization of the churches. Let the church be the Church, and the sense of human brotherhood will be revived; the redeemed will find that their differences from each other pale alongside the fact of their unity in Christ, and that their differences from the unredeemed are less important than their common dignity and shame in Adam. The Christian is not without principles on which to base his personal relationships, and they are comprehended in the obligation of love for neighbor. A friendly smile, a kindly word, a courteous act, speak more eloquently than a press release.

A voluntary segregation, even of believers, can well be a Christian procedure. A church may be impoverished by the racial limitations of its membership and also impoverished through indifference to cultural ties. Churches in which integration is not practiced may be just as Christian as those where it is found. The determining factor is exclusion or inclusion because of race. Are the Chinese congregations of New Orleans or Chicago or San Francisco unchristian because they prefer such an alignment? Are all-Negro or all-White churches necessarily monuments to racial prejudice? And may not the publicity of the integrated church reflect an emphasis on spiritual pride as much as the unintegrated church?

The churches in America are on the advance. The searching of soul is a good sign. Little can be gained by organizational pressures; more will be gained from mutual respect and forbearance. The long sweep of history not only shows the church and individual Christians on the side of justice; it shows the content of justice itself lifted and purified by the conscience of the church. In the long run, it will be so in America also even in matters of race. Let us hope this is a decade of decision and deed.

Patriotic Memorial Observance Distresses Formosa Christians

Long before the Chiang regime left the mainland and established itself on Taiwan there existed a smoldering resentment against government demands for participation in the Sun Yat-sen memorial service each Monday morning in schools and public offices.

This resentment came from two sources: patriotic nationals who felt that genuine patriotism could not be fostered by a regimented form of hero worship, and from Christians who felt that China’s background of ancestor worship conferred a religious significance upon the required minute of silence and bowing before a picture.

Despite the government’s insistence that this was only a patriotic gesture, an act of devotion to the father of the Chinese Republic such as saluting the flag in America, nevertheless the conflict with Christian conscience and the imposed form of patriotism has continued.

There are disquieting reports of a stepped up tempo of demands within the Chiang government, making the observance of this memorial service mandatory in all recognized schools and government offices. This is causing acute distress to patriotic Christians who feel at the same time that loyalty to country should not involve any violation of Christian conscience.

It will take more than committee reports to the Legislative Yuan to allay the anxieties of these Christians. A wilful disregard of the spiritual sensitivities of loyal citizens can eventually destroy the very loyalities the government is trying to demand.

Christian Radiance A Question Of Priority

Many Christians, were they to search their hearts, would be forced to admit that God is incidental, or, at best, secondary in their lives—not first.

From this one tragic fact stems a multiplicity of problems—personal, family and national. From this great deficiency there emerges also a great weakness in the church.

Both the Old and New Testaments make it abundantly clear that God expects of his own that they shall love him with their whole beings. From this love for God come the inspiration and power to love our fellow men. God is a jealous God, unwilling to share his rightful place with any person or thing.

If he does not hold first place just what are the consequences? Instead of having him as the pilot of our lives, instead of access to his supernatural and infinite resources, we continue in our failures and frustrations and share the powerlessness of those who neither know Christ nor the power of his resurrection. When God is relegated to second place in our homes, our ambitions for our children center in secular and material success. Many of the tragedies in Christian homes today have their origin in seeking worldly advantage, rather than coveting that Christ may have the preeminence.

The weakness of the church today is not in the number of those admitted to her membership. Church membership in America is both numerically and proportionately at an all-time high. But the witness of the Church is woefully weak because so few Christians give Christ top priority in their lives.

In the concluding days of World War II there was much talk of “total surrender.” What of total surrender to the living Christ? Inconvenient? To some it would be fearfully inconvenient because it would necessitate a separation from secret sin. To others it would be embarrassing because it would demand clear-cut honesty in business practices. Others again would find themselves faced with a decision to let Christian love take priority over selfish or prejudicial interest.

But there is a wonderfully bright side. If and when we do give Christ first place in our lives, seeking honestly by his grace to be his slaves, we are released into a glorious freedom that the world can never understand.

The lovely story is told of a man confronted by a series of complicated problems. He conferred with his minister who suggested: “Sit down, put a chair in front of you and imagine Christ is sitting there across from you. Just tell him about your problems.” In later years this man died in his sleep. His daughter went back into the room to find him lying peacefully there. To a friend she remarked: “Father was lying there just as I had left him, only his hand was laid on the empty chair.”

There is a pressing need that the church shall use every effort to win others to become Christians. There is also a pressing need that those of us who have named the name of Christ shall give him top priority. When this is done the glory of God will shine radiantly through the transformed veil of our own human imperfections. He demands and he deserves first place. How can we give him less?

Federal Aid To Education A Program Full Of Risks

In five years there has been a gain of five million students in the public elementary and preparatory schools in the United States. Educators are concerned, quite properly, over the need for room to accommodate this enlarging number of school children, and for teachers to instruct them.

Pressures are mounting for federal alleviation of these shortages. Despite misgivings about federal aid, since education is now primarily a state and local responsibility, President Eisenhower nonetheless continues to urge a $2,000,000,000 four-year federal aid program to meet these school needs.

How the national government can become involved to such an extent without encouraging a continuing clamor for such aid and without reflecting some measure of interference and control in education is a moot question. Subsidizing the thought life of the intellectuals of the next generation has taken the necessary preliminary step to shaping that thought life.

Moreover, the United States already has a federal debt of nearly $300,000,000,000. Year after year slips by with virtually no progress in the payment of that debt. The need for paying debts, rather than continuing them, is a lesson a government had best inculcate in its citizens, by example no less than precept.

Something must be done to provide for the educational needs of the youth, especially in a democracy which prizes an informed public opinion. There is a growing feeling that public opinion has been somewhat misinformed about the connection between palatial palaces (as some colossal school buildings today are dubbed) and effective education. The problem of education runs far deeper today than that of enough class rooms and enough teachers; it involves the question of methods and abiding values. And the indoctrination of youth in a view of life which does not grapple realistically with moral and spiritual priorities may well contribute, by a curious turn of events, to the weakening of the nation. The more profound danger is not that the American youngster will be deprived a place to learn, but rather, that he may be told what he must learn and encouraged to ignore some things that matter.

We Quote:

CONRAD N. HILTON

President, Hilton Hotels

A man is standing at Fiftieth and Park Avenue in New York City; he is waiting for the light to turn. Who is he? To the statistician standing at the window high above he is one unit in a crowd. To the biologist he is a specimen; to the physicist a formula of mass and energy; to the chemist a compound of substances. He is of interest to the historian as one of the billions of beings who have inhabited this planet of ours; to the politician as a vote; to the merchandiser as a customer, to the mailman as an address. The behaviorist sees him from his office across the street and tags him as an animal modified by conditioned reflexes; and the psychiatrist in the next suite as a particular mental type deviating in one way or another from the alleged normal. Each science pinpoints the poor fellow from some particular angle and makes him look foolish, like the candid camera shot that catches you in the middle of a yawn. Let any one of these specialists pigeonhole you and get you to look at yourself through his single eye and what you see will not be a man, but a fragment of a man.… But what is man like?… What gives him a unique dignity? Beware of asking—that way lies religion. And religion, according to our communist friends, is the enemy of man.… The minimum reading of history will convince you that religion is the background of our modern democratic ideal and the two forces had better get together if democracy is to work.—Remarks at the fifth annual Presidential Prayer Breakfast of International Christian Leadership, Feb. 7, 1957.

SAMUEL G. CRAIG

Presbyterian Editor and Author

Let us not forget that bad as are existing social conditions throughout Christendom, they would be infinitely worse were it not for that leaven that Jesus cast into the meal of humanity. If Jesus should cease His activities, it is certain not only that we would fail to make further progress along these lines but that we would lose what we have already gained, as evidenced by that retrogression that has taken place in once Christian lands.… Jesus’ effectiveness as a social reformer lies in His ability to deal with sin. Other reformers have much to say about imperfect legislation, unfavorable environment and such like, but they have little to say about sin … notwithstanding the fact that sin … is the great root-cause of social misery.—in Jesus of Yesterday and Today, p. 153.

Theology

Bible Text of the Month: Romans 8:28

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose

(Romans 8:28).

These words teach believers that whatever may be the number and overwhelming character of adverse circumstances, they are all contributing to conduct them into the possession of the inheritance provided for them in heaven.—ROBERT HALDANE.

How do we know? From the character of our God and Father as he is revealed in Christ; from the recorded experience of the servants of God (Joseph, Job, Moses, David); lastly, from what we have observed about ourselves. Have we not lived long enough to detect the marvellous adjustment and combination of events by which our spiritual education is being carried on? Yes, we do not conjecture, we do not merely hope and believe—we know.GORDON CALTHROP.

The whole world seems to contradict their hope of future glory. All things visible, especially the hatred of the hostile world, seem to oppose and gainsay their faith. And yet this fearful appearance can have no force, since all things are subject to the omnipotent and wise administration of God, on whose loving counsel their confidence is established. Still more, if all things are subject to God’s supreme authority, and this authority is exhibited in the development of his loving counsel, they know, with the full certainty of faith, that all things work together for their good.—J. P. LANGE.

St. Paul believes, then, that there is a purpose, an end, to which events are tending. It is a faith rather than the conclusion of an argument. Reason alone, it has been said, might arrive at an opposite conclusion. How can we see a providential guidance, a divine plan of any kind, in the bloody game which chiefly makes up what we call history? How can we trace it in the conduct of generations and races who successively appear upon the surface of this planet, to make trial, one after another, of the same crude experiments, as if the past had furnished no experience wherewith to guide them?… It is true enough that the purpose of God in human history is traversed and obscured by causes to which the apostles of human despair may point very effectively. Yet here, as always, where sight fails us, we Christians walk by faith, and we see enough to resist so depressing a conclusion as that before us.—BISHOP LIDDON.

All Things

The reference here is a wide one, but especially refers to events or agencies which are deemed adverse. As after each inundation of the Nile the soil is more fertile and rich, so the members of the Church of Christ, whether in their collective or individual capacity, should emerge from the waves of adversity with a greater fulness of strength. “Mowed down, we yet increase,” is the testimony of Tertullian in the days of martyrdom.—CHARLES NEIL.

If all these things work out a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, is not that good? Present bitters will render future sweets still sweeter. Heaven would not be that to us which it will be, were we not prepared by the chequered scenes of life for its enjoyments. Canaan would not have been so pleasant a rest, had Israel gone immediately to it without the circuitous course through the wilderness. God gives us every good by way of contrast; we should not enjoy our food, if strangers to hunger; nor the waters of life, if we were not athirst; we should not know the pleasures of rest, if strangers to toil; nor the joys of the upper world, if strangers to the sorrows of the present.—ANDREW FULLER.

Lovers Of God

God’s children, although to the world they may seem to be miserable, yet having communion and fellowship with him, they are always happy. The very worst day of God’s child is better than the very best day of the wicked. The worst day of Paul was better to him than the best day of Nero was to him; for the wicked, in the midst of their happiness, are accursed; whereas the godly, in the midst of their miseries, are blessed.—RICHARD SIBBES.

The love for God is the magician which extracts the ore, alike from failure and success and makes all promote man’s final and absolute good. No life is made up of such commonplaces that they cannot be made by the love of God to sparkle with the highest moral interest. No troubles are so great that they cannot be built into the steps of the staircase by which souls mount up to heaven. Aye, stranger still to say, no earthly prosperity need perforce enchain the soul and dull all its finer sensibilities, and kill out of it its sense of high destiny, if only the love of God be there to extract whatever is of lasting value and to cast the dross away.… The same set of circumstances may chisel out the finest lineaments in the saintly character or the darkest traits of the desperate criminal. That which makes the difference is the presence or absence of the love of God in the soul.—BISHOP LIDDON.

And this love to God, or delight in him, as it entitles such to that his care and concern for them which is expressed in this promise, so it doth in its own nature dispose their hearts to an acquiescence and satisfaction therein; for love to God, where it is true, is supreme and prevails over all other love to this or that particular good.—JOHN HOWE.

The Called

It implies that God had a plan, purpose or intention in regard to all who became Christians. They are not saved by chance or haphazard. God does not convert men without design; and his designs are not new, but are eternal. What he does, he always meant to do.—ALBERT BARNES.

That their calling here mentioned is the effectual call of God, which is answered by faith and obedience, because it consists in the bestowing of them on the persons so called, taking away the heart of stone and giving a heart of flesh, is not only manifest from that place which afterward it receives in the golden chain of divine graces, between predestination and justification (Rom. 8:30), whereby the one hath in fallible influences into the other, but also from that previous description which is given of the same persons, namely, that they love God, which certainly is a fruit of effectual calling.—JOHN OWEN.

The Christian may be called to bear the heaviest afflictions; but they shall bring him to consideration, stir him up to prayer, wean him from the world and lead him to seek his rest above. He may be assaulted also with the most distressing temptations; but these will show him the evil of his heart and the faithfulness of his God: they will also teach him to sympathize with his tempted brethren: even death itself will be among the number of the things that shall prove beneficial to him. This is the most formidable enemy to fallen man: it cuts him off from all means and opportunities of salvation, and seals him up under endless and irremediable misery; but to a true Christian it is a most invaluable treasure. It puts a period to all his sorrows and temptations, and introduces him to the immediate, everlasting enjoyment of his God.—CHARLES SIMEON.

Even the sins of believers work for their good, not from the nature of sin, but by the goodness and power of him who brings light out of darkness. Everywhere in Scripture we read of the great evil of sin. Everywhere we receive the most solemn warning against its commission; and everywhere we hear also of the chastisements it brings, even upon those who are rescued from its finally condemning power. It is not sin, then, in itself that works the good, but God who overrules its effects to his children,—shows them, by means of it, what is in their hearts, as well as their entire dependence on himself, and the necessity of walking with him more closely. Their falls lead them to humiliation, to the acknowledgement of their weakness and depravity, to prayer for the guidance and overpowering influence of the Holy Spirit, to vigilance and caution against all carnal security, and to reliance on that righteousness provided for their appearance before God.—ROBERT HALDANE.

For Good

How do all things work out for good? (1) By developing Christian character and excellencies; (2) increasing Christian reward; (3) advancing the interest and glory of God’s kingdom.—CHARLES NEIL.

They work together in their efficacy, in their unity, and in their connection. They do not work thus of themselves: it is God that turns all things to the good of his children. The afflictions of believers, in a peculiar manner, contribute to this end. “Before I was afflicted I went astray; but now have I kept thy word. It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes.” “Tribulation worketh patience.” “No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.”—ROBERT HALDANE.

Cover Story

Reflections on the Sanhedrin Verdict

Irwin H. Linton

The Jewish law concerning the offense and punishment of the crime of blasphemy was given by God. The law is clear, being confirmed and elucidated by precedent. No competent lawyer could dispute the many violations of this same law on the part of Jesus, climaxed by the “blasphemous” declaration under oath in the presence of the Sanhedrin that he was indeed “the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” To this he added the assertion that thereafter men would see him “sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.”

It is impossible to imagine such words on the lips of Caesar, or Paul or whoever is the greatest man who ever lived.

The “Christ, the Son of the living God,” about whom the high priest inquired, was to be a divine being—he “whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting,” who would be “Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.” This Jesus, the Son of Mary, who was the wife of the carpenter of Nazareth, after being adjured “by the Living God” to tell the truth, averred he was this very being.

Identity Of The Defendant

Among criminal trials this one is unique. For not the actions but the identity of the accused is the issue of debate. The criminal charge laid against Christ, the testimony or, rather, the act in the presence of the court, on which he was convicted, the interrogation by the Roman governor and the inscription and proclamation on his cross at the time of execution—all are concerned with the one question of Christ’s real identity. “What think ye of Christ? Whose son is he?”

Deity, in the sense that applies only to the Godhead, was what the Jews declared Christ claimed for himself, thereby committing, if the claim were false, the capital offense of blasphemy. “We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God” (John 19:7), the Jewish leaders declared to Pilate. They did indeed have such a law. God gave it to Moses. And this claim and assertion Christ made for himself both at his trial and throughout the years of his ministry, by direct statement, by clear implication and by conduct. While Christ was, as Isaiah foretold, at his trial as silent and uncomplaining as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, one question he instantly answered whenever it was addressed to him, either by the high priest or by the governor, was whether he was the “Son of the Highest” and whether he was a king. His answer was that he was indeed a king of another world and the Son of God, who would ultimately be seen sitting at the right hand of God and coming in the clouds of Heaven.

The Narrow Options

Under the indisputable law and the admitted facts—as contained in the records of his own followers—if Cicero himself, probably the ablest lawyer of the Roman bar, had been assigned to defend Christ, only two defenses were possible: the insanity of the accused or his supernatural character. In addition to being obvious, this position is supported by the highest legal authority.

But one way of escape from affirming as just Christ’s death sentence for blasphemy, without the mental suicide of denying the truth of the records, yet remains: that the defendant before the bar of justice was insane and therefore should have been acquitted.

The plea of insanity has saved many from the gallows. It should be well considered here, since there remains no other alternative to condemnation or acceptance of the prisoner’s assertion of deity.

From the evangelists we learn that the hypothetically non compos mentis Jesus of Nazareth engaged in debates with the keenest sophists and thinkers of his time—the scribes and Pharisees. Insane men may write poetry—as did Poe and Cowper—write music, paint surrealist pictures; but one thing an insane man cannot do is to engage in orderly, logical debate. This Christ did, and the terseness and completeness of his replies, arguments and parables present a perfection to us that could only be marred by the addition or subtraction of a single word or syllable.

We observe also another proof of absence of mental instability: Christ’s majestic calm and lack of excitement, his unfailing poise and self-control under all conditions, even the prolonged suffering and ignominy of death on the cross, in which no enemy can point to a flaw and no friend wish to change a detail. Only in Gethsemane do we see our Lord overwhelmed, and then, as Pascal observes, he who was utterly calm when afflicted by men, afflicted himself.

At his trial we find him, without aid of counsel, convincing the Roman judge of his right to acquittal and forcing the prejudiced Jewish tribunal to abandon regularity and judicial propriety to convict him.

The truth of Rousseau’s observation that “if Socrates died like a philosopher, Jesus died like a god” stands out when we consider how the manner of his dying differed from that of all other deaths recorded in history, heroic as many of them were. The differences all illustrate Christ’s mental firmness and self-possession and apparent consciousness of divine authority even when in articulo mortis hanging from a cross.

Considering Christ’s life, deeds, words, trial and death, could there be any prisoner for whom it would be more impossible to prevail with a plea for mercy on the ground of enfeebled intellect, lack of self-control, unsound mind?

Alternative To Blasphemy

We are confined to but one ground on which Christ can be acquitted. It is impossible to impugn the record of what he said and did. He was mentally responsible. The statute is clear. Only if he were divine could he be held innocent of the capital crime of blasphemy.

To clinch this contention, consider some extracts from classic sources of information on this subject: first the contention in favor of the probity of the Sanhedrin that tried Jesus, by the scholarly French Jew, Joseph Salvadore, who stands in the place of prosecuting attorney in the review of Christ’s trial; and then the words of the famous American lawyer, Simon Greenleaf, who assumes the role of counsel for the defense.

In his chapter, “Administration of Justice among the Hebrews,” in his famous work, published in Paris, Histoire des Institutions de Moise et du Peuple Hebreu (c. 1839) Salvadore writes: “… Jesus in presenting new theories, and in giving new forms to those already promulgated, speaks of Himself as God; His disciples repeat it, and the subsequent events prove in the most satisfactory manner that they thus understood Him. This was shocking blasphemy in the eyes of the citizens; the law commands them to follow Jehovah alone, the only true God; not to believe in gods of flesh and bone, resembling men or women; neither to spare nor listen to a prophet who, even doing miracles, should proclaim a new god, a god neither they nor their fathers had known.

“Jesus having said to them one day: ‘I have come down from heaven to do these things,’ the Jews, who till then had listened to Him, murmured and cried: ‘Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary? We know his father, his mother, and his brethren; why then does he say that he has come down from heaven?’ On another day, the Jews, irritated from the same cause, took stones and threatened Him. Jesus said unto them: ‘I have done good works in your eyes by the power of my Father, for which of these works would you stone me?’ ‘It is for no good work,’ replied the Jews, who stated the whole process in a few words, ‘but because of thy blasphemy; for being a man thou makest thyself God’.…

“The witnesses testify, and they are numerous, for the deeds of which He is accused were done in the presence of all the people.… Finally the high priest addresses the accused and says: ‘Is it true that thou art Christ, that thou art the Son of God?’ ‘I am he,’ replies Jesus; ‘you shall see me hereafter at the right hand of the majesty of God, who shall come upon the clouds of heaven.’ At these words Caiaphas rent his garments in token of horror. ‘You have heard him.’ They deliberate. The question already raised among the people was this: Has Jesus become God? But the senate having adjudged that Jesus, son of Joseph, born at Bethlehem, had profaned the name of God by usurping it to Himself, a mere citizen, applied to Him the law of blasphemy and the law in the 13th chapter of Deuteronomy and the 20th verse in chapter 18, according to which every prophet, even he who works miracles, must be punished when he speaks of a god unknown to the Jews and their fathers: the capital sentence is pronounced. As to the ill-treatment which followed the sentence, it was contrary to the spirit of the Jewish law; and it is not in the course of nature that a senate composed of the most respectable men of a nation, who, however they might have been deceived, yet intended to act legally, should have permitted such outrages against Him whose life was at their disposal.…”

“Jesus was brought before Pilate, the procurator the Romans had placed over the Jews.… Pilate, the Roman, signed the decree.… But before the execution, the governor had granted to the condemned an appeal to the people, who, respecting the judgment of their own council, would not permit this favor, couching their refusal in these terms: ‘We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God’.…

“Jesus was put to death. The priests and elders went to the place of punishment; and as the sentence was founded upon this fact, that He had unlawfully arrogated to Himself the title of Son of God, God Himself, they appealed to Him thus: ‘Thou wouldst save others, thyself thou canst not save. If thou are indeed the king of Israel, come down into the midst of us and we will believe in thee; since thou hast said, I am the Son of God, let that God who loves thee come now to thine aid.’ According to the Evangelists these words were a mockery; but the character of the persons who pronounced them, their dignity, their age, the order which they had observed in the trial, prove their good faith. Would not a miracle at this time have been decisive?”

Thus argues the learned Jewish scholar Joseph Salvadore, who shared the Modernist denial of Christ’s deity.

From A Famous American

And when we hear the counsel for the defense, for the accused Christ, Simon Greenleaf, we find he has no other defense to offer for Christ than his real deity:

“The death of Jesus is universally regarded among Christians as a cruel murder, perpetrated under the pretense of a legal sentence, after a trial in which the forms of law were essentially and grossly violated. The Jews to this day maintain that, whatever were the merits of the case, the trial was at least regular and the sentence legally just; that he was accused of blasphemy and convicted … by legal evidence.…

“It will now be necessary to consider more particularly the nature of the crime of blasphemy, in its larger signification, as it may be deduced from the law of God. That the spirit of this law requires from all men everywhere and at all times the profoundest veneration of the Supreme Being and the most submissive acknowledgment of him as their rightful Sovereign is too plain to require argument. If proof were wanted, it is abundantly furnished in the Decalogue, which is admitted among Christians to be of universal obligation.…

“… The law of blasphemy, as it was understood among the Jews, extended not only to the offence of impiously using the name of the Supreme Being, but to every usurpation of his authority or arrogation by a created being of the honor and power belonging to him alone.… And in such horror was it held by the Israelites that in token of it every one was obliged, by an early and universal custom, to rend his garments whenever it was committed or related in his presence.…”

The Record Is Clear

“Such being the general scope and spirit of the law, it would seem to have been easy to prove that Jesus had repeatedly incurred its penalties. He had performed many miracles but never in any other name than his own. In his own name, and without the recognition of any higher power, he had miraculously healed the sick, restored sight to the blind and strength to the lame, cast out devils, rebuked the winds, calmed the sea and raised the dead. In his own name, also, and with no allusion to the Omniscient, no ‘Thus saith the Lord, he had prophesied of things to come. He had by his own authority forgiven sins, and promised, by his own power, not only to raise the dead but to resume his own life after he should, as he predicted, be put to death. Finally, he had expressly claimed for himself a divine origin and character, and the power to judge both the quick and the dead. Considered as a man he had usurped the attributes of God.

“That he was not arrested at an earlier period is to be attributed to his great popularity and the astounding effect of his miracles. His whole career had been resplendent with his beneficence to the thousands who surrounded him. His eloquence surpassed all that had been uttered by man. The people were amazed, bewildered, fascinated by the resistless power of his life. It was not until his last triumphal visit to Jerusalem, after he had openly raised Lazarus from the dead, when the chief priests and elders perceived that ‘the world is gone after him,’ that they were stricken with dismay and apprehension for their safety and under this panic resolved upon the perilous measure of his destruction.…”

Preacher In The Red

PITY FOR THE POOR

As a country vicar I rarely visited London, and was quite unused to London ways. On a very memorable occasion I traveled to that city in clerical dress and used the underground railway. My ticket was checked and punched at the departure platform, and upon arrival at the terminal station I threw it away not realising that tickets would be collected. Much to my surprise, at the barrier an official asked me for my ticket. I explained that I had paid my fare, but had thrown my ticket away. “You will have to pay again,” was the prompt reply. “But really I have already paid,” I protested. I was just going to pay the money when from a queue that stood waiting a poorly dressed laborer stepped forward and said in a loud voice, “ow much is it, gov’ner?” “Four pence,” said the official. Then slamming four pennies on the counter, he said, “’ere y’are, gov’ner, let the poor beggar go.” It all happened in a flash, and in the presence of a number of waiting passengers. In my embarrassment I simply flew into the street and lost myself in the crowded station exit.—The Rev. ALBERT H. BROOMFIELD, Flintshields, Winterbourne-Houghton, Blandford, Dorset, England.

Irregularities Of Trial

“The only safe method in which this could be accomplished was under the sanction of a legal trial and sentence. Jesus, therefore, upon his apprehension was first brought before the great tribunal of the Sanhedrin, and charged with the crime of blasphemy.… Such was the estimation in which he was held that it was with great difficulty that witnesses could be found to testify against him; and the two who at last were procured testified falsely in applying his words to the temple of Solomon which he spake of the temple of his body.… But though the witnesses swore falsely in testifying that he spake of the Jewish temple, yet his words in either sense amounted to a claim of the power of working miracles and so brought him within the law.

“The high priest, however, still desirous of new evidence, which might justify his condemnation in the eyes of the people, proceeded to interrogate Jesus concerning his character and mission. ‘I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God. Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying, He hath spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy. What think ye? They answered and said, He is guilty of death.’ [Italics added.]

“We may suppose the multitude standing without the hall of judgment, able through its avenues and windows to see but not to hear all that was transacting within. It became important, therefore, to obtain some reason upon which the high priest might rend his clothes in their sight, thus giving to the people, by this expressive and awful sign, the highest evidence of blasphemy, uttered by Jesus in the presence of that august assembly. This act turned the tide of popular indignation against him, whose name but a short time before had been the theme of their loudest hosannas.…

“If we regard Jesus simply as a Jewish citizen, and with no higher character, this conviction seems substantially right in point of law, though the trial were not legal in all its forms. For whether the accusation were founded on the first or second commands in the Decalogue, or on the law laid down in the thirteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, or on that in the eighteenth chapter and twentieth verse, he had VIOLATED THEM ALL by assuming to himself powers belonging alone to Jehovah. And even if he were recognized as a prophet of the Lord, he was still obnoxious to punishment under the decision in the case of Moses and Aaron, before cited.

“It is not easy to perceive on what ground His conduct could have been defended before any tribunal unless upon that of his superhuman character. No lawyer, it is conceived, would think of placing His defence upon any other basis.”

Is it not utterly clear that there is no intermediate position between confession of Christ’s deity and confirmation of the Sanhedrin’s condemnation and execution of him as a blasphemer? It is equally clear that the matter of Christ’s deity and identity is not a mere “moot question.” The logical and almost inevitable result of denying full deity to him is to abandon the whole doctrine and transaction of atonement. The divine identity and deity, the atoning death, the bodily resurrection—all stand or fall together. That God should himself die to atone for his creatures’ sins against himself is a conception too presumptuous for human origin; to refuse this atonement is the one sin too presumptuous for divine forgiveness.

Who will begrudge fealty and honor to a Sovereign who shed his blood, who gave his life for his people—one so gentle that little children nestled in his arms; so mighty that he cast out with a word a myriad of demons, stopped a storm and wrested Lazarus from the claws of the great dragon, death; one who called the wicked rulers at Jerusalem a generation of vipers, but who, writing in the dust, was too courteous to look into the shamed eyes of the woman taken in adultery, whom he cleared with a sentence without impugning one iota of the law?

Shall we not hasten, while the divine “proclamation of amnesty” is still unrevoked, to swear our allegiance to the coming Prince of Glory?

Fifty years a member of the bar of the District of Columbia, Attorney Irwin H. Linton, a devout Christian layman, was privileged to practice before the U. S. Supreme Court. He is author of The Sanhedrin Verdict, portions of which are incorporated in this article by permission of Loizeaux Brothers, Publishers.

Cover Story

Come Before Winter

Clarence Edward Macartney

“Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me.… Do thy diligence to come before winter.”—2 Tim. 4:9, 21

Napoleon Bonaparte and the Apostle Paul are the most renowned prisoners of history. One was in prison because the peace of the world demanded it; the other because he sought to give to men that peace which the world cannot give and which the world cannot take away. One had the recollection of cities and homes which he had wasted and devastated; the other had the recollection of homes and cities and nations which had been blessed by his presence and cheered by his message. One had shed rivers of blood upon which to float his ambitions. The only blood the other had shed was that which had flowed from his own wounds for Christ’s sake. One could trace his path to glory by ghastly trails of the dead which stretched from the Pyrenees to Moscow and from the Pyramids to Mount Tabor. The other could trace his path to prison, death, and immortal glory by the hearts that he had loved and the souls that he had gathered into the Kingdom of God.

Napoleon once said, “I love nobody, not even my own brothers.” It is not strange, therefore, that at the end of his life, on his rock prison in the South Atlantic, he said, “I wonder if there is anyone in the world who really loves me.” But Paul loved all men. His heart was the heart of the world, and from his lonely prison at Rome he sent out messages which glow with love unquenchable and throb with fadeless hope.

When a man enters the straits of life, he is fortunate if he has a few friends upon whom he can count to the uttermost. Paul had three such friends. The first of these three, whose name needs no mention, was that One who would be the friend of every man, the friend who laid down his life for us all. The second was that man whose face is almost the first, and almost the last, we see in life—the physician. This friend Paul handed down to immortality with that imperishable encomium, “Luke, the beloved physician,” and again, “Only Luke is with me.” The third of these friends was the Lycaonian youth Timothy, half Hebrew and half Greek, whom Paul affectionately called “My son in the faith.” When Paul had been stoned by the mob at Lystra in the highlands of Asia Minor and was dragged out of the city gates and left for dead, perhaps it was Timothy who, when the night had come down, and the passions of the mob had subsided, went out of the city gates to search amid stones and rubbish until he found the wounded, bleeding body of Paul and, putting his arm about the Apostle’s neck, wiped the blood stains from his face, poured the cordial down his lips and then took him home to the house of his godly grandmother Lois and his pious mother Eunice. If you form a friendship in a shipwreck, you never forget the friend. The hammer of adversity welds human hearts into an indissoluble amalgamation. Paul and Timothy each had in the other a friend who was born for adversity.

Paul’s last letter is to this dearest of his friends, Timothy, whom he has left in charge of the church at far-off Ephesus. He tells Timothy that he wants him to come and be with him at Rome. He is to stop at Troas on the way and pick up his books, for Paul is a scholar even to the end. Make friends with good books. They will never leave you nor forsake you. He is to bring the cloak, too, which Paul had left at the house of Carpus, in Troas. What a robe the Church would weave for Paul today if it had that opportunity! But this is the only robe that Paul possesses. It has been wet with the brine of the Mediterranean, white with the snows of Galatia, yellow with the dust of the Egnatian Way and crimson with the blood of his wounds for the sake of Christ. It is getting cold at Rome, for the summer is waning, and Paul wants his robe to keep him warm. But most of all Paul wants Timothy to bring himself. “Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me,” he writes; and then, just before the close of the letter, he says, “Do thy diligence to come before winter.”

Why “before winter”? Because when winter set in the season for navigation closed in the Mediterranean and it was dangerous for ships to venture out to sea. How dangerous it was, the story of Paul’s last shipwreck tells us. If Timothy waits until winter, he will have to wait until spring; and Paul has a premonition that he will not last out the winter, for he says, “The time of my departure is at hand.” We like to think that Timothy did not wait a single day after that letter from Paul reached him at Ephesus, but started at once to Troas, where he picked up the books and the old cloak in the house of Carpus, then sailed past Samo-thrace to Neapolis, and thence traveled by the Egnatian Way across the plains of Philippi and through Macedonia to the Adriatic, where he took ship to Brundisium, and then went up the Appian Way to Rome, where he found Paul in his prison, read to him from the Old Testament, wrote his last letters, walked with him to the place of execution near the Pyramid of Cestius, and saw him receive the crown of glory.

Before winter or never! There are some things which will never be done unless they are done “before winter.” The winter will come and the winter will pass, and the flowers of the springtime will deck the breast of the earth, and the graves of some of our opportunities, perhaps the grave of our dearest friend. There are golden gates wide open on this autumn day, but next October they will be forever shut. There are tides of opportunity running now at the flood. Next October they will be at the ebb. There are voices speaking today which a year from today will be silent. Before winter or never!

I like all seasons. I like winter with its clear, cold nights and the stars like silver-headed nails driven into the vault of heaven. I like spring with its green growth, its flowing streams, its revirescent hope. I like summer with the litany of gentle winds in the tops of the trees, its long evenings and the songs of its birds. But best of all I like autumn. I like its mist and haze, its cool morning air, its field strewn with the blue aster and the goldenrod; the radiant livery of the forests—“yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red.” But how quickly the autumn passes! It is the perfect parable of all that fades. Yesterday I saw the forests in all their splendor, and Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

But tomorrow the rain will fall, the winds will blow, and the trees will be stripped and barren. Therefore, every returning autumn brings home to me the sense of the preciousness of life’s opportunities—their beauty, but also their brevity. It fills me with the desire to say not merely something about the way that leads to life eternal but, with the help of God, something which shall move men to take the way of life now, Today. Taking our suggestion, then, from this message of Paul in the prison at Rome to Timothy in far-off Ephesus—“Come before winter”—let us listen to some of those voices which now are speaking so earnestly to us, and which a year from today may be forever silent.

The Voice Which Calls For Reformation

Your character can be amended and improved, but not at just any time. There are favorable seasons. In the town of my boyhood I delighted to watch on a winter’s night the streams of molten metal writhing and twisting like lost spirits as they poured from the furnaces of the wire mill. Before the furnace doors stood men in leathern aprons, with iron tongs in their hands, ready to seize the fiery coils and direct them to the molds. But if the iron was permitted to cool below a certain temperature, it refused the mold. There are times when life’s metal is, as it were, molten, and can be worked into any design that is desired. But if it is permitted to cool, it tends toward a state of fixation, in which it is possible neither to do nor even to plan a good work. When the angel came down to trouble the pool at Jerusalem, then was the time for the sick to step in and be healed. There are moments when the pool of life is troubled by the angel of opportunity. Then a man, if he will, can go down and be made whole; but if he waits until the waters are still, it is too late.

A man who had been under the bondage of an evil habit relates how one night, sitting in his room in a hotel, he was assailed by his old enemy, his besetting sin, and was about to yield to it. He was reaching out his hand to ring the bell for a waiter, when suddenly, as if an angel stood before him, a voice seemed to say, “This is your hour. It you yield to this temptation now, it will destroy you. If you conquer it now, you are its master forever.” He obeyed the angel’s voice, refused the tempter and came off victorious over his enemy.

That man was not unique in his experience, for to many a man there comes the hour when destiny knocks at his door and the angel waits to see whether he will obey him or reject him. These are precious and critical moments in the history of the soul. In your life there may be that which you know to be wrong and sinful. In his mercy God has awakened conscience, or has flooded your heart with a sudden wave of contrition and sorrow. This is the hour of opportunity, for now chains of evil habit can be broken, which, if not broken, will bind us forever. Now golden goals can be chosen and decisions made which shall affect our destiny forever.

We like to quote those fine lines from the pen of the late Senator John J. Ingalls:

Master of human destinies am I!

Fame, love, and fortune on my footsteps wait.

Cities and fields I walk; I penetrate

Deserts and fields remote, and, passing by

Hovel and mart and palace, soon or late,

I knock unbidden once at every gate!

If sleeping, wake; if feasting, rise before

I turn away. It is the hour of fate,

And they who follow me reach every state

Mortals desire, and conquer every foe

Save death; but those who doubt or hesitate,

Condemned to failure, penury or woe,

Seek me in vain and uselessly implore—

I answer not, and I return no more.

We all recognize the truth of this in the things of this world, but in a far more solemn way it is true of the opportunities of our spiritual life. You can build a bonfire any time you please; but the fine fire of the Spirit, that is a different thing. God has his Moment!

We cannot kindle when we will

The fire that in the heart resides

The Spirit bloweth and is still;

In mystery the soul abides.

The Voice Of Friendship And Affection

Suppose that Timothy, when he received that letter from Paul asking him to come before winter, had said to himself: “Yes, I shall start for Rome; but first of all I must clear up some matters here at Ephesus, and then go down to Miletus to ordain elders there, and thence over to Colossae to celebrate the Communion there.” When he has attended to these matters, he starts for Troas, and there inquires when he can get a ship which will carry him across to Macedonia, and thence to Italy, or one that is sailing around Greece into the Mediterranean. He is told that the season for navigation is over and that no vessels will sail till springtime. “No ships for Italy till April!”

All through that anxious winter we can imagine Timothy reproaching himself that he did not go at once when he received Paul’s letter, and wondering how it fares with the Apostle. When the first vessel sails in the springtime, Timothy is a passenger on it. I can see him landing at Neapolis, or Brundisium, and hurrying up to Rome. There he seeks out Paul’s prison, only to be cursed and repulsed by the guard. Then he goes to the house of Claudia, or Pudens, or Narcissus, or Mary, or Ampliatus, and asks where he can find Paul. I can hear them say: “And are you Timothy? Don’t you know that Paul was beheaded last December? Every time the jailer put the key in the door of his cell, Paul thought you were coming. His last message was for you, ‘Give my love to Timothy, my beloved son in the faith, when he comes.’ ” How Timothy then must have wished that he had come before winter!

Before winter or never! “The poor always ye have with you; but me ye have not always,” said Jesus when the disciples complained that Mary’s costly and beautiful gift of ointment might have been expended in behalf of the poor. “Me ye have not always.” That is true of all the friends we love. We cannot name them now, but next winter we shall know their names. With them, as far as our ministry is concerned, it is before winter or never.

In the Old Abbey Kirk at Haddington one can read over the grave of Jane Welsh the first of many pathetic and regretful tributes paid by Thomas Carlyle to his neglected wife: “For forty years she was a true and loving helpmate of her husband, and by act and word worthily forwarded him as none else could in all worthy he did or attempted. She died at London the 21st of April, 1866, suddenly snatched from him, and the light of his life as if gone out.” It has been said that the saddest sentence in English literature is that sentence written by Carlyle in his diary, “Oh, that I had you yet for five minutes by my side, that I might tell you all.” Hear, then, careless soul, who art dealing with loved ones as if thou wouldst have them always with thee, these solemn words of warning from Carlyle: “Cherish what is dearest while you have it near you, and wait not till it is far away. Blind and deaf that we are, O think, if thou yet love anybody living, wait not till death sweep down the paltry little dust clouds and dissonances of the moment, and all be made at last so mournfully clear and beautiful, when it is too late.”

On one of the early occasions when I preached on this text in Philadelphia, there was present at the service a student in the Jefferson Medical College (Dr. Arnot Walker, New Galilee, Pennsylvania). When the service was over he went back to his room on Arch Street, where the text kept repeating itself in his mind, “Come before winter.” “Perhaps,” he thought to himself, “I had better write a letter to my mother.” He sat down and wrote a letter such as a mother delights to receive from her son. He took the letter down the street, dropped it in a mailbox, and returned to his room. The next day in the midst of his studies a telegram was placed in his hand. Tearing it open, he read these words: “Come home at once. Your mother is dying.” He took the train that night for Pittsburgh, and then another train to the town near the farm where his home was. Arriving at the town, he was driven to the farm and, hurrying up the stairs, found his mother still living, with a smile of recognition and satisfaction on her face—the smile which, if a man has once seen, he can never forget.

Under her pillow was the letter he had written her after the Sunday night service, her viaticum and heart-ease as she went down into the River. The next time he met me in Philadelphia he said, “I am glad you preached that sermon, ‘Come Before Winter.’ ” Not a few have been glad because this sermon was preached. Let us pray that the preaching of it tonight shall move others to do that which shall make their hearts glad in the years to come.

Twice coming to the sleeping disciples whom he had asked to watch with him in the Garden of Gethsemane, Christ awakened them and said with sad surprise, “What, could ye not watch with me one hour?” When he came the third time and found them sleeping, he looked sadly down upon them and said, “Sleep on now, and take your rest.” One of those three, James, was the first of the twelve apostles to die for Christ and seal his faith with his heart’s blood. Another, John, was to suffer imprisonment for the sake of Christ on the isle that is called Patmos. And Peter was to be crucified for his sake. But never again could those three sleeping disciples ever watch with Jesus in his hour of agony. That opportunity was gone forever! You say, when you hear that a friend has gone, “Why, it cannot be possible! I saw him only yesterday on the corner of Smithfield and Sixth Avenue!” Yes, you saw him there yesterday, but you will never see him there again. You say you intended to do this thing, to speak this word of appreciation or amendment, or show this act of kindness; but now the vacant chair, the unlifted book, the empty place will speak to you with a reproach which your heart can hardly endure, “Sleep on now, and take your rest! Sleep! Sleep! Sleep forever!”

The Voice Of Christ

More eager, more wistful, more tender than any other voice is the voice of Christ which now I hear calling men to come to him, and to come before winter. I wish I had been there when Christ called his disciples, Andrew and Peter, and James and John, by the Sea of Galilee, or Matthew as he was sitting at the receipt of custom. There must have been a note not only of love and authority but of immediacy and urgency in his voice, for we read that they “left all and followed him.”

The greatest subject which can engage the mind and attention of man is eternal life. Hence the Holy Spirit, when he invites men to come to Christ, never says “Tomorrow” but always “Today.” If you can find me one place in the Bible where the Holy Spirit says, “Believe in Christ tomorrow,” or, “Repent and be saved tomorrow,” I will come down out of the pulpit and stay out of it—for I would have no Gospel to preach. But the Spirit always says, “Today,” never “Tomorrow.” “Now is the accepted time.” “Now is the day of salvation.” “Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” “While it is called Today.”

The reason for this urgency is twofold. First, the uncertainty of human life. A long time ago, David, in his last interview with Jonathan, said, “As thy soul liveth, there is but a step between me and death.” That is true of every one of us. But a step! What shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue!

An old rabbi used to say to his people, “Repent the day before you die.”

“But,” they said to him, “Rabbi, we know not the day of our death.”

“Then,” he answered, “repent today.” Come before winter!

The second reason why Christ, when he calls a man, always says Today, and never Tomorrow, is that tomorrow the disposition of a man’s heart may have changed. There is a time to plant, and a time to reap. The heart, like the soil, has its favorable seasons. “Speak to my brother now! His heart is tender now!” a man once said to me concerning his brother, who was not a believer. Today a man may hear this sermon and be interested, impressed, almost persuaded, ready to take his stand for Christ and enter into eternal life. But he postpones his decision and says, “Not tonight, but tomorrow.” A week hence, a month hence, a year hence, he may come back and hear the same call to repentence and to faith. But it has absolutely no effect upon him, for his heart is as cold as marble and the preacher might as well preach to a stone or scatter seed on the marble pavement below this pulpit. Oh, if the story of this one church could be told, if the stone should cry out of the wall and the beam out of the timber should answer, what a story they could tell of those who once were almost persuaded but who now are far from the Kingdom of God. Christ said, Today! They answered, Tomorrow!

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,

……..

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death.

Once again, then, I repeat these words of the Apostle, “Come before winter”; and as I pronounce them, common sense, experience, conscience, Scripture, the Holy Spirit, the souls of just men made perfect, and the Lord Jesus Christ all repeat with me, “Come before winter!” Come before the haze of Indian summer has faded from the fields! Come before the November wind strips the leaves from the trees and sends them whirling over the fields! Come before the snow lies on the uplands and the meadow brook is turned to ice! Come before the heart is cold! Come before desire has failed! Come before life is over and your probation ended, and you stand before God to give an account of the use you have made of the opportunities which in his grace he has granted to you! Come before winter!

Come to thy God in time,

Youth, manhood, old age past;

Come to thy God at last.

In the weeks before Dr. Clarence Edward Macartney’s death on Feb. 20, Christianity Today inquired as to the internationally-famed preacher’s favorite sermon. Dr. Macartney, with characteristic modesty, could single out none for “greatness.” But he reminded the editors that many of his hearers have considered Come Before Winter, here printed, as their favorite. Elected moderator of the General Assembly in 1924 at the age of 45 after a nominating speech by William Jennings Bryan, Dr. Macartney led the evangelical witness in the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. He was the author of over 50 books on religious and historical themes. One of Christianity Today’s contributing editors, he wrote the magazine when it was first projected: “I will be glad to serve as a contributing editor on Christianity Today. You have an impressive list of names, most of whom I know.… With the prayer that the Holy Spirit will bless this effort to advance the Kingdom of Christ.…”

Cover Story

The Spirit in the Old Testament

J. G. S. S. Thomson

In the Old Testament the Spirit operates in two spheres: in the realm of nature and in the life of man. In nature, the Spirit is depicted as an agent who creates (Gen. 1:2; Job 26:13; Isa. 32:15) and who sustains what has been created (Ps. 104:30; Job 34:14). This serves to remind us not only that God created the world, but that the principle that animates nature is not a blind, unreasoning force. The Spirit is not mere physical energy but is life-breathing, vitalizing what God the Father created through the Word (cf. John 1:1–3; Heb. 11:3).

The Old Testament presents this same Spirit as present in the life of man and active at four different levels of man’s personality.

“The Lord God … breathed into his [man’s] nostrils the breath of life,” and in virtue of this “man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7). “The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life” (Job 33:4). The purely physical human organism is vitalized by the breath of God.

Elsewhere in the Old Testament the spirit of man appears as the animating principle, but this does not conflict with the Genesis account of man’s creation. For the vitalizing power that is the Spirit of God belonged to man, and could, therefore, properly be called the spirit of man (Job 27:3; Ps. 104:29 f.). Both views teach that the life that animates the physical organism results from God’s communication of his spirit.

Now it is this Spirit in man—or, if you will, it is man’s spirit—that distinguishes him from the beast and imparts a unique pre-eminence to man. This is the Old Testament explanation of a self-evident fact.

This Spirit in man is the special gift of God, and constitutes also the source of righteousness, wisdom and morality in man, placing him in a relation with God that is unshared by the animal world.

If it be argued that the terms in Genesis 2:7 are used also in Genesis 6:22, in reference to the animal world in general, it may be pointed out that Genesis 1:27 introduces a factor which distinguishes man absolutely from the rest of animate creation. In addition to his being animated by the Spirit of God, man is created “in the image of God.” These two phenomena—his being created in the image of God, and his being vitalized by the Spirit of God—are not, however, two distinct factors in the nature of man. This spiritual quality of man’s physical organism proclaims his original creation in the divine image.

It may also be argued that some of man’s higher faculties manifest themselves in animals. But even there we find an unbridgeable gulf between man and animals. In man these faculties are conjoined with self-conscious reason; in animals this conjunction is absent. And the conjunction in man is not the result of an evolutionary process but of the inbreathing of God of his Spirit into man. It is this that makes man a spiritual, self-conscious being, capable of communing with God and reflecting something of the character of God. It is the root of man’s rationality and morality. It is man’s inmost self, the essence of his manhood. And this image of God in man did not disappear with the fall. It is handed on to posterity (Gen. 5:1, 3; 9:6) and is the possession of all men in varying degrees.

But this concept of man’s physical organism vitalized by the Spirit of God portrays but the beginning of the Spirit’s activity in the human personality. The Old Testament depicts the Spirit also as the source of man’s mental life, creative faculties, ineradicable moral sense and capacity for knowing and communing with God. Let us consider these elements in turn.

The Spirit And Man’s Mental Life

When God breathed into man’s nostrils the breath of life, he not only vitalized the human organism but he made man a living soul. This implies not merely animation but intelligence. “There is a spirit in man; and the breath of the Almighty giveth them understanding” (Job 32:8). The Spirit is indissolubly linked, in the Old Testament, with the intellectual element in man (cf. Exod. 28:3; 31:3; 35:31; Deut. 34:9). This conjunction is even clearer in the Septuagint, which speaks of “a divine spirit of wisdom, and understanding and knowledge” (Exod. 31:3; 35:3) and of “the spirit of wisdom and perception” (Exod. 28:3). When this “divine spirit of wisdom” became operative in man, intellectual powers, unique among created beings, were manifested.

The Old Testament gives us several examples of such manifestation. Joseph’s discernment and wisdom and his ability to interpret dreams are said to be due to his being “a man in whom the Spirit of God is” (Gen. 41:38 f.). Moses was given the Spirit to help him bear “the burden of his people” (Num. 11:17), i.e., to enable him to dispense judgment at the tribunal (Exod. 18:22 f.), a task requiring the use of the critical faculties to an unusual degree. The seventy elders were also given the Spirit to enable them to assist Moses in guiding and governing the people (Num. 11:16 f.). Bezaleel, the chief artificer in constructing the Tabernacle, was also filled with the Spirit of God, in virtue of which he had the ability to devise complicated designs, execute work in various metals and carve in stone and wood (Exod. 31:2 ff.). Bezaleel’s chief assistant and all the workmen under their direction also shared in this artistic skill, which had its source in the Spirit of God (Exod. 35:30–36:2).

Clearly then, the Old Testament teaches that the Spirit of God, who originated the personal life of man, is also the source of man’s intellectual life; and that where the Spirit is allowed to act in a special degree, outstanding powers manifest themselves. This means that our reason is not completely other than the divine reason. Reason in man is that which feels, wills and apprehends goodness; and God, not being pure reason, also wills, and feels and cares. But it is the Spirit of God which in the divine nature feels (Mic. 2:7), thinks (Isa. 40:13 f.) and acts ethically (Ps. 143:10); and it is this same Spirit in man who feels and thinks, and apprehends goodness.

The Spirit And Man’s Moral Life

In two passages in the Old Testament the Spirit is called the Holy Spirit, Psalm 51:11 and Isaiah 63:10 f. Now, if to this additional fact concerning the nature of the Spirit we conjoin the fact of the divine Spirit’s presence in man, then moral life in man becomes not merely a possibility but a human necessity.

In Proverbs 20:27, “the spirit of man” (which means the Spirit of God in man) is described as “the lamp of the Lord,” whose function is to “search the innermost parts” of man. This is probably a reference to conscience, the inner mentor that tests a man’s motives and feelings, thoughts and actions by God’s law, approving some, condemning others, as they agree or disagree with that criterion. In other words, this divine Spirit who is the principle of life in man and the source of his intellectual gifts is also present as “a moral witness against sin.”

If the rendering of Genesis 6:3 in the Authorized Version—“My Spirit shall not always strive with man”—can be maintained, then here also the divine Spirit appears as a moral witness in man against his sin. Indeed, even if the Hebrew be rendered “rule,” or “judge,” in man, its ethical significance would still be apparent.

What we today would describe as a guilty conscience was explained in the Old Testament in terms of the activity within man of an evil spirit from, or of, the Lord (1 Sam. 16:14; 18:10; 19:9). In 1 Samuel 16:3, this spirit is spoken of as “a spirit of God.” These verses have particular reference to King Saul, and indicate that his guilty conscience had sprung into life through a divine agent that was tormenting his spirit through its accusations. A guilty conscience, a sense of sin, is somehow connected with the activity of a supernatural spiritual agency. This is another aspect of the Old Testament conviction that a moral sense in man is produced by the Spirit of God.

The divine Spirit’s connection with man’s moral life is further established in later Old Testament writings where the word “spirit” connotes in man a fixed state of mind, a permanent attitude of heart, a man’s character. The predominating feature of a man’s disposition may be pride (Eccles. 7:8), haughtiness (Prov. 16:18), quick temper (Eccles. 7:9), humility (Prov. 16:19), patience (Eccles. 7:8) or faithfulness (Prov. 11:13), but in every case the outstanding failure of the character is described as a spirit.

The Spirit And Man’s Religious Life

The presence of the Spirit in man must, of necessity, be significant for his religious life for two reasons. It is the Spirit in man that links him to God, and creates the capacity to know, and commune with, God (Isa. 26:9). And it is the Spirit in man that makes him a moral being, and enables God to lay moral demands upon him. But man as a sinful, fallen creature cannot fulfill these moral demands. He requires a power not native to himself to enable him to respond to moral demands from which he cannot escape.

This is what Ezekiel undoubtedly recognized when he gave God’s epoch-making promise: “I will put a new Spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh: that they may walk in my statues, and keep mine ordinances, and do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.… I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of Israel” (11:19 f.; 39:29; cf. 36:26 f.); Jeremiah’s reference to the New Covenant (31:33 f.) carries the same theme.

Here is something new in the Old Testament’s teaching on the relations between man and the Spirit in the religious life. It anticipates a revolutionary change in man’s nature involving such an invasion of spiritual power and such a renewal of character that it would amount to a rebirth in man’s experience. This conception had to wait till Pentecost for fulfillment. If Joel, Jeremiah and Ezekiel were dealing with actual spiritual experience, then at best their words could have meaning only for a few choice souls in Israel.

Even the change of heart promised to King Saul (1 Sam. 10:6, 9) was clearly not of this striking moral or spiritual nature. It was not yet the time of fulfillment of Moses’ yearning cry: “Would God that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his Spirit upon them!” (Num. 11:29). Moral reformation there was, but not spiritual regeneration. The Spirit was still only the source of moral goodness, not the Agent of the birth that is from above.

But this must not lead to undue depreciation of the conception of the Spirit’s activity in the religious life of man in the Old Testament. Sufficient justice must be done to the fact that in the Old Testament the Spirit of God is the Holy Spirit. Why must the tide “Holy Spirit” (Ps. 51:11; Isa. 63:10 f.) be interpreted to mean that holiness is not to be predicated of the Spirit per se, that the Spirit is holy only because the Spirit is the Spirit of the God of holiness? Old Testament saints would be able to predicate holiness of the Spirit because in their experience, limited though it must have been, the Spirit produced holiness of life. It was the Spirit who implanted in the heart “the fear of the Lord” (Isa. 11:2), “righteousness” (Isa. 32:15–17) and a penitent and prayerful spirit (Zech. 12:10).

In the Old Testament the most spectacular evidence of the Spirit in the religious life of man is seen in the experience of the prophets. Through them the Lord communicated his word (Zech. 7:12), and to them he revealed his secrets (Amos 3:7). The Spirit was the power in which the prophet proclaimed his message (Mic. 3:8). It was natural, therefore, that the prophet should be known in Israel as “the man that hath the Spirit” (Hos. 9:7).

It is significant too that one of the chief results of the universal outpouring of the Spirit in New Testament times would be that its recipients would prophesy (Joel 2:28). Obviously, then, the Spirit was the main factor in this phenomenon of Old Testament religious experience. What differentiated the true prophet from the false was precisely that the Spirit lifted up the former into fellowship with God, enabled him to understand, and then to communicate, the divine will to his fellows.

This surely is the only adequate explanation of the genuine inspiration that characterize the prophet’s writings, and which makes them a divine revelation. How otherwise explain the habit of the prophets in attributing their message, spoken or written, to the Spirit of God (2 Sam. 23:22; Ezek. 2:2; 3:24, etc.), and of Isaiah’s and Jeremiah’s constant use of the solemn phrase “thus saith the Lord”?

In A Greek New Testament

Language of high and laurelled Attic song,

Homer’s wide wings, and Plato’s cadences;

O trophied speech! Thy mightiest honor is

That God hath made of thee his human tongue.

—NATHAN R. WOOD

Professor J. G. S. S. Thomson served with the staff at New College, Edinburgh, while completing doctoral studies at University of Edinburgh. He specialized in Old Testament and cognate studies and served for eight years in Algeria, French North Africa, as a missionary among Arabic-speaking Moslems. He returned to Scotland as assistant in the Department of Hebrew and Semitic Languages, University of Edinburgh. He is now visiting associate professor of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary, Decatur, Ga.

Cover Story

Segregation and the Kingdom of God

E. Earle Ellis

Christianity Today March 18, 1957

Race relations is probably the most important problem agitating the Christian conscience today. Secular integrationists are calling upon the Church to speak to the problem—assuming that if it “spoke,” it would call for the solution that the integrationists demand. As a matter of fact the Church has spoken and is speaking, but it does not speak with one voice. The cleavage is particularly apparent if one avoids that un-Protestant confusion of the voice of the clergy with the “voice of the Church.” Since the Supreme Court decision of 1954, the issue has been focused in terms of “segregation” versus “integration.” Within this framework Christian integrationists champion their position as “the Christian way” and dismiss the views of segregationists as naive or prejudiced.

Most of the integrationist press treats the question as if all segregationist thinking stemmed from emotional, ignorant or ulterior motives. Religious periodicals, with some exceptions, tend to identify integration with Christianity and segregation with the forces of iniquity. This attitude is not just an oversimplification; it is a basic distortion of the issues. It identifies the principle of segregation with certain evils in segregation-in-practice. It illogically leapfrogs from the proposition, “Integration is concordant with Christian race relations,” to the contention, “Integration is necessary for Christian race relations.” Finally, it ignores the injustices present in integration-in-practice in the North, and the evil implicit in a consistent integrationist philosophy.

Note: In a 2018 editorial, CT highlighted this article as a leading example that “during this crucial era of American history, CT did not lead as much as reflect the moral ambiguity and confusion of that era’s white evangelical churches. Though today we champion racial justice as a vital component of Christian discipleship, we must acknowledge and repent of this part of our history.”

A Southern Point Of View

Few Southerners—certainly few Christians—will defend in toto segregation-in-practice in the South. Too often the color line has been viewed as horizontal rather than vertical; unchristian white men—like unchristian men everywhere—have used their racial status to bully or to prey upon the weaker group; and the slogan “separate but equal” has preserved the separate and forgotten the equal. The greatest sin of Christian segregationists has not been their individual relationship with Negroes but their indifference to chronic injustices within the dual social system. In the forties, Virginius Dabney and a number of other Southerners organized to correct some of these injustices within the segregation formula. Dabney cites the reason for their failure (American Magazine, August, 1956): “There was no cooperation from influential segments of Southern society. The result of such indifference was the removal of the Negro capital from Atlanta to New York and the shifting of Negro leadership from Southern moderates to Northern radicals.”

This is not the whole story however. Raymond Moley has correctly identified the two salient facts in the segregated South over the past half-century—the great progress of the Negro and the great improvement in racial attitudes. Within the segregation pattern the South has opened the door to the professions for the Negro, in some ways surpassing integrationist areas. In each of several Southern states, for example, there are as many Negro school teachers (receiving “equal pay” and in some areas a higher average pay) as in thirty-one Northern and Western states combined (cf. Dabney); segregated Meharry and Howard universities have provided more Negro doctors than all of the integrated institutions of the North. For several decades preceding the Supreme Court decision, inequities had declined and the business and professional strata of Negro society had increasingly developed. “In the South they have segregation,” replied a Mississippi Negro to his surprised Northern college professor, “but Southerners are kinder to Negroes than Northerners are.” Segregation does not necessitate bad race relations, nor does integration guarantee good ones. On the contrary, the very opposite often appears to be true.

It is sometimes asserted that segregation almost always is associated with domination of and discrimination against the weaker group. It would be more accurate, however, to say that whenever diverse groups have been associated under a political unit, whether on an integrated or a segregated basis, the tendency has been to discriminate against the weaker. This is true of some “integrated” minority groups in Europe today—a problem that finds a “segregation” solution in the political realm through racial, rather than merely geographical, representation in parliament. On the other hand, eastern Canada is an example of segregation equitably administered. The French and the English have separate schools and churches, move in their own social circles and maintain distinct cultural divisions in an attitude of mutual respect.

It is not unnatural that the Christian in the North should look askance upon segregation. He can see no good reason for it (the “melting pot” philosophy worked for the Poles and the Germans, why not for the Southerner and the Negro?); he weighs it in terms of individual discriminations, e.g., the inferior Negro school (a complaint passe in many areas) or the poorer Negro residential area; and he hears of it only in caricature. Emotional and sentimental factors are particularly strong where the problem can be solved by a slogan. It is no secret that the integration sentiment of most white Christians increases in direct proportion to their distance from the Negro as a group factor in society.

The integrationist, viewing the problem as one of “personal” exclusion, overlooks or denies the relevancy of treating it as a group relationship. Christians in the South have a different reality to face: There is de facto a biracial society with vast numbers of each group; cultural, sociological and psychological differences between the races are considerable. (Only a naive appraisal can reduce the problem to one of “skin color.”) Freedom of association, in the eyes of the South, is a liberty applicable to group as well as individual relationships. The white South desires—and holds it to be a right—to preserve its European racial and cultural heritage; this cannot be done if integration is enforced in social institutions, e.g., the schools. Intermarriage, whether in the 2nd generation or the 10th, is a question which, in Alistair Cooke’s phrase, “only the intellectual, the superficial and the foreigner far from the dilemma can afford to pooh-pooh” (Manchester Guardian Weekly, May 24, 1956). The soothsayer may confidently predict that this will not happen, or publicize as the “scientific” view (as though scientists were agreed on the matter) that racial differences are merely physical and environmental. The essential point is that the people who must live in the situation are convinced, for reasons sufficient for them, that integration will be destructive of their society, ultimately an evil rather than a good. (Compare H. R. Sass, “Mixed Schools and Mixed Blood,” The Atlantic, Nov., 1956.) And they are confident that, where the white and black races live together in considerable numbers, the concept of a dual society applying a principle of segregation in varying degrees according to the exigencies of particular situations will, when directed by a Christian conscience, provide the more equitable and harmonious relationship.

The master-servant relationship is passing in the South, and some modus vivendi is desperately needed to replace it. Segregation has the potential to develop into a partnership of mutual respect; this partnership can never arise from a judicial force bill which is intolerable to one of the groups. Southerners often wonder whether integrationists are as interested in good race relations as in forcing a particular kind of race relations. The unfortunate fact is that ardent Christian integrationists, however conscientious, are one cause of the worsening race relations in the South today. Their moral superiority complex, their caricature of the segregationist as an unchristian bigot and their pious confession of the sins of people in other sections of the country have not been wholly edifying.

Segregation in America is, and should be, a fence not a wall, a division with many openings. In former years in the South the writer occasionally visited colored churches and enjoyed their fellowship in an atmosphere of Christian love; they on occasion visited his. At that time segregation was the norm, recognized and approved by both groups; yet it was no bar to friendship or fellow ship in many areas. Then came the integrationist, a self-righteous harbinger of a “new world a-comin,” pounding his pulpit drum and condemning all opposition to Gehenna. The outlines of his new world have come: and what is the cause of the growing resentment, fear, animosity and discord? Why, the segregationist, of course!

Across The Ohio

Whatever appeal integration has for Southern Negroes, it has been produced by the current identification of everything bad with segregation and everything good with integration. Even to the more sophisticated outside the South the word still casts a spell, but some of its luster no doubt has faded. They came north to the promised land, but they crossed the river to find it wasn’t Jordan at all but only the Ohio. In the North Negroes are integrated—at the bottom. There are exceptions, of course, but by and large integration-inpractice is full of discriminations: A Negro student sometimes cannot fulfill his requirements because no integrated school will accept him for student teaching. In Negro sections business and professional services are largely in the hands of whites. There is no “separate but equal” formula to equalize facilities between “white” New Trier and Chicago’s “black” south-side schools.

If the 90-year integration experiment in the North had produced a just and amicable relationship, it might be more attractive to the South. Actually, integration has most signally failed in just those areas which most nearly approximate—in population ratio—the Southern scene. The integrationist “blockbuster” approach is exemplified by Trumbull Park (Chicago) where Negroes were assigned to a white housing project. The result has been riot, race hatred and a 24-hour police guard for more than a year. In nearby Gary, Indiana, Andrew Means, a Negro contractor, using a segregationist approach, has built six Negro suburban-type communities. Race relations are good. Nevertheless, integrationists encounter a mental block at the suggestion that segregation has merit as a pattem-for-living in a multiracial society.

The Southerner can understand the sentimentalist, but the inconsistency of most integrationists is harder to comprehend. In the integrationist North, papers often censor local racial unrest (to prevent riot), then editorialize about immoral segregation in the South. When teaching Sunday School in Chicago’s “black” south side, the writer failed to encounter any homes of Christian integrationists. They live in “white” suburbs, send their children to “white” schools, and then travel through Negro areas to their editorial offices, professions and businesses where they expatiate against segregation. Sometimes they favor admitting a Negro to their suburb if he is the “right kind” of Negro. A Christian friend of the writer, quite integration-conscious, mentioned having had Negro dinner guests. “Of course,” he added, “they were clean and educated—no one like Isaac (our janitor).” Is this the fulfillment of New Testament ethics?

The point is not that the integrationist would defend integration-in-practice in the North. But in condemning the segregationist’s failure to achieve a “separate and equal” society, the integrationist fails to realize the implication of his own failure to achieve a “mixed and equal” society. This failure hardly recommends integration as “the solution” to racial discrimination and animosity—a goal that both groups seek. If Southern Christian leaders can do no better than to follow the integrationist approach of their brothers to the North, the future is less than bright.

And The Kingdom Of God

Both integrationists and segregationists are extremely eager to quote God as on their side. However, the Scriptures most frequently used, the “curse of Ham” argument in Genesis and the “one blood” argument in Acts, are irrelevant. The New Testament does indeed picture all Christians as being united. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, free nor slave, rich nor poor, educated nor ignorant, clean nor dirty, black nor white (cf. Gal. 3:28; Col. 3:11). But in New Testament Christianity this is a unity in diversity, a unity which transcends differences and works within them, but never a unity which ignores or denies differences or necessarily seeks to erase them. The servant is no less a servant, the master no less a master; the rich no less rich, and the poor no less poor. The New Testament ethic is not “we are the same, there is no difference; we are equal, therefore I love you” but rather “we are not the same, we are not equal in many ways; but I love you and desire your good.” The Gospel was not primarily to change the pattern of society, but to bring to bear new motives and new attitudes within the pattern. It is true that Christianity effected changes in the pattern, but its approach was totally different from the integrationist’s philosophy today.

Integration as a moral imperative has its roots in a secular view of the Kingdom of God in which the Kingdom is identified with the church and ultimately with the society of this world, and is to be brought in by social reforms. For the New Testament, however, whatever its manifestation within the Christian community is, the Kingdom of God is never to be identified with or find its consummation in a this-world society. (Compare T. W. Manson, The Teaching of Jesus, p. 134; E. Stauffer, New Testament Theology, p. 196.) Even within the church the differences between individuals and/or groups are not done away. Paul and Barnabas came to the conclusion that in certain circumstances their best unity lay in separation (Acts 15:36–46). Jewish and Gentile Christians differed in many practices, e.g., the observance of the Sabbath and other Old Testament laws (Rom. 14:5, 6; Acts 18:18; 21:23 ff), differences that ultimately resulted in “ecclesiastical” separation. Not only does the Apostle not view these differences as sinful, but he rather insists on the right of the groups to continue in them (Gal. 2:5; Rom. 14). In other words, the unity of Christians does not necessarily mean a physical “togetherness” or organizational conformity; the Kingdom in the church does not negate the church’s relation to the social customs of the world and of the churches: The same Paul who said that there was neither male nor female in Christ also instructed women to be silent in church (cf. 1 Cor. 11:4; 14:34).

The creed of consistent integrationist Christians could be summed up in the phrase, “the right to belong”; and their heresy, “the refusal to belong.” In their minds “togetherness” is a good, exclusiveness an evil. God—whatever else he is—is certainly “democratic”; segregation is “undemocratic” and therefore immoral.

Only when one applies the philosophy of integration consistently—thankfully most integrationists are not consistent—can he see its full implications. In Christ there is no rich nor poor; therefore, says the economic integrationist, we must integrate society through Christian socialism to eliminate evil class distinctions. It is wrong, cries the political integrationist, to discriminate against a man because of “an accident of birth”—birth in a foreign country; world government and world citizenship are the answers to this wrong. The ecclesiastical integrationist intones: denominations are evil per se, they divide us; we must fulfill Christ’s prayer “that they may be one” by uniting in the “coming great church.” Segregation is discrimination, concludes the racial integrationist, and “de-segregation” is its cure.

The argument for racial integration and the use of governmental force to implement it is a part of a pattern that is very evident in other areas of life. (And how often the voices in the argument vaguely remind one of voices heard at other times, on other issues.) It is a bad argument. Christian communism does not yield a good economic relationship; the “one church” organization does not give true Christian unity; cultural leveling does not produce a common bond of friendship; integration does not alleviate racial animosity and injustice. Further, it is an argument that is ethically anemic: in the name of equality it destroys the liberty of individuals and groups to live and develop in associations of their own preference; in the name of unity it points with undeviating insistence toward authoritarianism and conformity, eschewing the inherent sin root in human society with its inevitable consequence: power corrupts and total power corrupts totally.

If the Kingdom of God as a monolithic homogeneous structure is the goal of Christian ethics—if national, economic, cultural, racial, ecclesiastical distinctions are to be abolished as “immoral,” then the integrationist argument is sound. But if the Kingdom of God is seen as intersecting—and yet above—a this-world framework, compatible with—and yet superseding—the many and varied distinctions in this present age; then segregation is, in principle, an equally valid answer. And in practice it is much more compatible with liberty. Christian integrationists are patently sincere in the path they are forging, but the road signs along that path sometimes remind one more of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World than of the New Testament’s Kingdom of God.

A native of Florida, E. Earle Ellis holds the B.S. degree from the University of Virginia, the M.A. and B.D. degrees from Wheaton College Graduate School and the Ph.D. from University of Edinburgh. His dissertation, “Paul’s Use of the Old Testament,” has just been published. He is Assistant Professor of Bible and Religion at Aurora College, Illinois.

Cover Story

Christianity and the Sense of Tragedy

W. Stanford Reid

The feeling that life is fundamentally tragic seems to be common to the human race. The tendency toward death, frustration and what Carlyle has called “the inane” seems for most men to be the dominant theme of earthly existence. True, in times of expansion, of economic and social improvement, men have usually become optimistic, declaring this to be the best possible world and that every day in every way we are getting better and better. But let there be ever so slight a “recession” and the immediate change of tone in the chorus of optimism becomes very noticeable. The sense of tragedy very soon reasserts its rule over the human heart and mind.

That this is so is seen early in the history of civilization and culture. To the Greeks, for instance, the highest type of dramatic art, that which most truly portrayed life, was tragedy. Aristotle held that such representation performed a catharsis in those who witnessed it, enabling them to project themselves into the situation depicted in the drama. By so doing, they would be able to evaluate and overcome the catastrophic in their own lives. Here, as in much Eastern thinking, the black tragedy of man’s existence is taken for granted.

The Forms Of Tragedy

To the Greek dramatist, whether Sophocles, Euripedes or another, tragedy had one of three principal forms. The hero might find himself in conflict with society and its conventions, the result being virtual outlawry and death. Such an end, however, was not so tragic as that of the man who dared to fight with the gods. If he attempted this, his end was foreordained, for the gods would crush him with the weight of their roaring thunderbolts. In an even worse plight was the man in conflict with himself. There lay the deepest depth of tragedy, for such a one was not only the victim but also his own prosecutor and judge.

Thus, in Greek thought, anyone worthy of the name of man was obliged to enter into one form of conflict or other. As an individual he had to face the demands of society, religion or even his own human nature. One answer he could offer to these demands was submission, but by giving this answer he really ceased to be an individual and a man. This was slavery. On the other hand, he could go his own independent way, a way leading inevitably to a conflict ending only in defeat. But having fought a good fight, he would go down with his flag flying. Here was the gloriously tragic moment of life.

Such an approach to life assumes, of course, a whole philosophy or world-and-life view. It holds that life is fundamentally void, for man is destined to defeat and consequently to hopelessness. The hero is one who does not really overcome but who faces life defiantly and, by maintaining his own individual integrity, transmutes defeat into true victory. This is the tragedy which underlies all of life, for it reveals the ultimate vanity of all human endeavor.

It is upon this tradition that the great Western dramatists have built. This theme lies at the heart of Milton’s Samson Agonistes, which the author prefaced with a discussion of Aristotle and his views of the tragic. Corneille and Racine both followed the same pattern. Only Shakespeare at first appears to be different, but he too in King Lear, Macbeth or Othello, while perhaps more psychologically profound, follows the same well-worn path. Whether it be man’s fatuous love, his pride or his lust, they all lead to a destruction which he can only resist, daring the gods to strike him down with their searing darts of lightning.

Bleakness In Modern Life

Nor has our thinking changed much in our own day and age. We, who would seem to have good reason for optimism, particularly if we live in the Western Hemisphere, might well be excused for a certain buoyancy of outlook. Yet, on every hand, tragic bleakness seems to dominate. Robert Louis Stevenson commented more than once on this fact, and the parade of great novelists and writers only bears him out too well. Dreiser, Hardy, D. H. Lawrence, Proust, Dylan Thomas and many others continually point up the fact that life is essentially calamitous. Going even further, historian-philosophers, such as Spengler and Toynbee, declare that civilizations, like the individual, can end only in tragic death.

One may, of course, object that this attitude is a product of extreme intellectualism. It is the fate of the university professor, rather than of the man in the street. Yet is this true? Is it not true that it is part and parcel, not merely of Western, but of human thought? How often have we heard it prophesied in the past few years that there will be a third world war, and that this war will bring about the end of all things! Man seems to accept it as axiomatic that he will eventually bring himself to destruction, perhaps because of his very efforts to survive. In a hostile universe he can look forward to nothing but ultimate disaster. Despite all that he does, the universe will ultimately run down, bringing man’s hard-won achievements in art, science, religion and war to nothing. There is the ultimate tragedy.

And what practical effect does this have upon men? They see no value to life. They make money, they amass power, they build up a reputation. But where does it all lead? There is nothing beyond, for death ends all, and frustration is the common lot of man. Out of this situation come inner tensions, which in turn lead to social conflicts. The individual in his drive, in his search for something beyond his own puny efforts, to make life mean something finds himself opposed by others with the same tensions and acquisitive desires. The result is war in the economic, political or international sphere, and this in turn destroys man and his glory, civilization, and their cultures, nations and their achievements. Man agrees that

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,

And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,

Await alike the inevitable hour,

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Mirror Of Man’s Need

The Christian church in human society and the individual Christian as a member of society both have seriously to face this common interpretation of life. A mere glib “God’s in His heaven, all’s right with the world” sort of attitude does not solve the problem, nor overcome the difficulty. Does Christianity, therefore, have any real answer to, any effective argument against, the usual “philosophy of tragedy?” Or, does it simply admit that life is vanity of vanities about which man can do absolutely nothing?

In considering this matter, the Christian must of course realize that this belief in ultimate tragedy is a revelation of man’s need. As man becomes more self-conscious, so he becomes more “tragedy-conscious.” His sense of uncertainty and insecurity grows stronger as he more clearly sees his own smallness against the background of the universe. At times he has felt that he could govern all things by his reason, but before long, further knowledge has made him realize that he was dealing with something far beyond his power to control. Thus it has indeed been true that “he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow” (Eccles. 1:18).

To the Christian this is not unexpected. After all, when man frankly and bluntly refuses to acknowledge God as sovereign, he cannot expect anything else. A limited god, or no god at all, leaves the universe as the plaything of chance and the sport of conflicting currents of forces. In the circumstances, all that man can do is fight back at his environment, in the hope that some day in the future he may see victory—or oblivion. Man’s sin is thus at the root of his tragic sense.

Its Roots Are Deep

One may well ask then if Christianity sees no tragedy in life. Is Christianity a religion of facile optimism that goes its way without considering or caring for the emptiness which obviously lies so close to the surface of all human endeavor and activity? No, Christianity realizes that there is indeed a tragic side to life, but it believes that its roots lie deeper than most men realize.

The Christian bases his understanding of tragedy upon his belief in the doctrine fundamental to all Christian thought—God’s sovereignty. Because God is sovereign, he is the Creator, Sustainer and Ruler of all that is (John 1:3–5; 1 Cor. 8:6; Col. 1:16, 17). Indeed, he is more: the Redeemer of his people, sovereignly saving them by his grace (John 1:12 f.; 3:3, 6, 7, 16; Rom. 8:28 ff.; Eph. 1, 2). God is absolute in all things.

Yet although God’s sovereign goodness is so bountifully manifest in creation and providence, man continues in rebellion. Although God continually displays his kindness to man in providing what he needs in this life, man shows neither gratitude nor thanksgiving. He prefers to declare that all these things are attained by his own hard work, or even by chance. Completely egocentric, he ignores God, refusing the submission that he should offer (Rom. 1:19–20).

Nevertheless, the sovereign God continues by his providence to sustain and govern the rebel, not only providing him with those things which he needs, but even restraining the ravages of sin in his mind and body. Although man laughs in his face, God still keeps him in this life, for the rebel is utterly dependent, though he acknowledge it not, upon him.

As if this evidence of God’s goodness were not enough, he has entered into history speaking to men through the mouths of prophets and apostles, and calling upon them to return to him. Most important of all he entered into man’s world as man, in the person of Jesus Christ. And in the Incarnation, which led to his death on Calvary’s cross, he substituted himself for man, that he alone might bear the penalty of man’s continual and obstinate rebellion. Here was the supreme manifestation of divine sovereign grace.

The Rebellious Creature

Yet in spite of God’s infinite grace, in spite of all his calls to return, man pays little or no attention. Faced with the offer of the Gospel, he turns his back upon it, and we hear the tragic cry of the Savior: “How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not” (Matt. 23:37). Here is one aspect of the Christian sense of tragedy: the tragedy of the rebellious creature.

But there is another side to it, for Christ adds the words: “Behold your house is left unto you desolate.” The tragedy of life consists not only in man’s turning away from the call of the sovereign God but also in the fact that God in his just and righteous wrath may, and does, turn away from his rebellious creatures. This is tragedy indeed—the tragedy of Hell, far greater, deeper and more enduring than anything man can imagine: eternal death.

The Initiative Of Grace

Yet no Christian would ever admit that tragedy is the final word. For the Christian, tragedy is never the end, since God’s grace is as ultimate as his justice. Even though the Christian once rebelled and fought against God, in his infinite mercy and loving kindness God has laid hold upon him. He has sweetly wooed him back to himself, and hope has blotted out the feeling of vanity and emptiness.

The Christian, however, must continually emphasize that this has not happened because of his own willingness or desire to turn to God, but because God in Christ and through the Holy Spirit has taken the initiative.

Born again from above, “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:13), God’s people turn to him in faith and obedience, knowing that they have been saved from black tragedy, by the sovereign grace of God alone.

Swallowed Up In Hope

The Christian cannot and does not seek to escape from the sense of tragedy in the world. But his view of tragedy is not the result of a sense of insecurity forced upon him by a world of chance. He sees tragedy in man’s continual rejection of the sovereign God of grace; but at the same time he also sees tragedy swallowed up in hope. Christ has died; yea, he has risen again and he offers salvation freely to all. Tragedy is not ultimate, for Christ lives and reigns as the Redeemer and Intercessor for all who come unto him by faith.

How does the Christian view affect one’s attitude toward life? For one thing, the Christian realizes that God has called him in this life to serve him. The Apostle Paul never tired of stressing this point when dealing with the individual members of the early Church, because it gave to even the humblest Christian a sense of vocation. God had summoned the Christian to service; therefore the Christian, even though a slave, was God’s freedman.

And out of this sense of calling comes a further result. The Christian’s work, feeble, sinful and ineffectual though it might be, if it is done honestly, faithfully and conscientiously, will redound to the glory of the sovereign God. Thus, even the humblest ditch digger can glorify God in his work. Moreover, this is not just for a day, or a year, but for all eternity, for “their works do follow them.” This destroys frustration, emptiness, tragedy. We are working for the eternal glory of the King of Kings.

“Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58).

END

Components

Dust … and clay …

and the voice of God.

Here is the Creator’s handiwork;

Here is dust … and clay.

The highest of all organisms,

yet of the earth.

The most complex of God’s creations:

Insignificant.

What good can come of dust …

and clay?

Dust of itself is nothing;

Clay—little more.

What then remains?

The voice of God.

DONALD CLAIR REAM

W. Stanford Reid teaches in Canada in the city of his birth, at McGill University, Montreal, where he is Associate Professor of History and Warden of Men’s Residences. He holds the Ph.D. degree from the University of Pennsylvania and is author of The Church of Scotland in Lower Canada, Economic History of Great Britain and Problems in Western Intellectual History since 1500.

Theology

Review of Current Religious Thought: March 04, 1957

G. C. Berkouwer

In the year 1956 at the 70th anniversary of the famous Swiss theologian Karl Barth, many theologians published articles on the significance of the theology of Barth. That was to be expected, since Barth since 1920 has dominated the field of dogmatic theology in several countries.

Barth started the dialectical theology as the theology of the Word of God together with Thurneyson, Brunner and Bultmann. In 1933 came a deep split in the dialectical movement. Since that time we see divergences between Barth and Brunner, Barth and Bultmann, and so on. Only Thurneyson and Barth have remained theological friends from the beginning.

Barth’s largest work is his Kirchliche Dogmatik, now published in ten big volumes. The work is not yet finished. We still expect, if he will have the opportunity to finish it, two parts of volume IV (reconciliation) and the last volume on the eschatological theme.

In 1956 was published a book of 960 pages, wholly devoted to articles on the person or the work of Barth. The authors were theologians and philosophers from many countries and continents. Several important articles dealt with the doctrine of the image of God in Barth’s theology, his doctrine of preaching, Barth and the Heidelberg Catechism, the laughing Barth, Barth and the Roman Catholic Church and the relation between Gospel and Law. This latter theme does not surprise us in this work, because in recent years this relation has become more and more the central theme in Barth’s own theology. There was criticism exactly on this point from the Lutherans, because Barth talked of the law as the form of the Gospel and was attacked on this point that he had no real and important place for the specific significance of the law. Important also is the article of his friend Thurneyson, who wrote together with him the famous commentary on Paul’s epistle to the Romans in the beginning of the dialectical theology in 1918. Thurneyson writes on the contacts and correspondance between him and Barth in that first time. This was an important article as far as orientation is concerned on the origins of this movement.

It will be interesting for American readers to hear that in this book there is also an article from the pen of Emilio E. Castra on the theological situation in South America and on the theology of Barth. He mentions especially the controversy with Rome and the contradiction between fundamentalism and modernism. It might be interesting to write afterwards more broadly on this article, since not everybody will have the opportunity to read this book of nearly 1000 pages!

The last article I mention is from Gempo Hoshino on the relation of Buddhistic thinking and the theology of Barth. Many readers will be surprised by it. Is there any relation between Christianity and Buddhism? The writer tells us of a large influence of Barth’s ideas in the scientific circles of the largest Buddhistic sect in Japan and he tries to analyze the problem of the point of contract. I don’t know if Barth will be happy with this article; the comparison is, as far as I can see, rather superficial.

Besides this big book several other articles also appeared in connection with Barth’s anniversary. In England was published a book, Studies in Christology. It is not a book on Barth’s theology. But when they gave it to Barth on his visit to England last year, he said that it was the theme he judged the most important. Everybody who reads Barth’s book knows how strong the Christological impact has become on Barth’s theological thinking.

In Switzerland the Theologische Zeitschrift (Basel) devoted two numbers in honor of Barth. Some of the articles handle a special theme of Barth’s theology, the sovereignty of God. Especially important, although it does not concern Barth immediately is the article of Oscar Cullmann, Professor in New Testament in Basel and a colleague of Barth on a very important subject: the of the soul and the resurr dead in the witness of the New Testament. This is a theme discussed in the Western European theology of the last 30 years, especially in connection with the question whether the immortality of the soul is a product of Greek thinking or belongs to the New Testament witness. I have the impression that after a long period of criticism of the doctrine of the intermediate state we are now on the way to rethinking this problem. And the remarkable thing is that this is not originating from an egotistical motive (our human importance) but from the message of the New Testament according to the blessed hope, of which the New Testament is speaking. It will be extremely interesting to follow the discussions when Barth, in his fifth volume, will handle the problems of eschatology. That does not mean that we do not know anything about Barth’s views on eschatology. In my book, The Triumph of Grace in the Theology of Karl Barth, I tried to analyze the eschatological triumph in Barth’s thinking. I know—not only from his books but also from personal encounter—how important he estimates the problems of his last volume to be. They are not only important for theologians but for the whole church of Christ. If there is any point where the discussions of theology touch the church in her faith, it is surely the expectation of the Church, the character of the Christian hope.

The discussions of theology are not to dominate the church. Surely theologians do not have a special privilege for entrance into the kingdom. They also have to listen to the word of the Lord: “I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes,” (Matthew 11:25). But they are not excluded either if they want to serve the Church of Jesus Christ. In that service, everything becomes important, even difficult problems coming up not out of the depth of our autonomous thinking but out of the unfathomable depth of the word of the Lord.

This review of live spiritual and moral issues debated in the secular and religious press of the day is prepared successively for CHRISTIANITY TODAY by four evangelical scholars: the Rev. Phillip Hughes of England, Prof. William Mueller of the United States, Prof. G. C. Berkouwer of the Netherlands, and Prof. John H. Gerstner of the United States.—ED.

Books

Book Briefs: March 4, 1957

Useful Collection

The Ministry in Historical Perspectives, edited by H. Richard Niebuhr and Daniel D. Williams. Harper, New York, 1956. $5.00.

Making surveys is one of the most popular scholarly occupations of our day. It is a relatively painless way of educating not only the surveyed but the surveyor. Sometimes it is pointed at one, sometimes at the other, but usually both benefit if there is any organization at all in the undertaking.

The theological seminaries of the United States and Canada have recently been undergoing such a survey. It has been under the direction of the two editors of this present book and of James M. Gustafson. Some preliminary results appeared in a series of mimeographed bulletins and the final statements are now appearing in three books. The volume under review is the second of the three to appear. It has less to do directly with the survey than either of the other two but may prove, in the long run, to be the most useful of all. Judgment on that point must be reserved until the third appears and time has passed to note the effects. In any case, this volume is a real bonanza for anyone interested in the ministry and how it has reached its present state.

The editors of the volume are not among the contributors, most of whom are professors of church history in American theological schools. They include, in order, John Knox who deals with the ministry in the primitive church, George H. Williams who covers the ante-nicene and patristic periods, Roland H. Bainton for the middle ages and Wilhelm Pauck for the Reformation. Edward R. Hardy deals with modern priestly ministries, Winthrop S. Hudson with the Puritans and Sidney E. Mead and Robert Michaelsen with the American scene.

The post-apostolic age always leads to speculation on the actual course of events, since our sources of information are very limited and do not provide all the desired answers. Knox is a little bolder and more radical in this speculation than is necessary or, in fact, than is likely, in the light of what we do know, to represent the real state of affairs. For example, by considering the Pastoral epistles as non-Pauline and by holding the book of Acts to be “considerably later than Paul” (p. 20), he is able to discuss the offices of bishop, deacon and others at considerable length without introducing the subject of the presbyter or elder. The treatment of the latter follows in a separate section. This results in what seems to me to be a distortion of the picture. There are, however, great excellencies in the clarity of presentation and the use that is made of many of the sources.

The other periods are better provided with source material and the authors, therefore, are able to walk on surer ground. The attractiveness and vivid character of the style varies from contribution to contribution but taken as a whole they are a brilliant and most useful coliection. There is nothing else just like this and nothing as good as this at present available. Williams handles his material in masterly fashion. Bainton is not as technical but is marvellously evocative of the medieval situation. Pauck supplies much information not otherwise generally available concerning conditions at the time of the Reformation. Hardy is concerned to present the ideal as well as the actual. I am not sure that Hudson is quite up to his usual level though he gives a competent review of the Puritan period in England, but Mead has a splendid analysis of the distinctive American scene. It does not push the evidence too far, as Mead has sometimes done. Michaelsen’s characterization of the fundamentalist minister, unfortunately, is on the cheap side (pp. 258 f.).

Almost every institution and office can only be understood if its history is known. The contemporary ministry is no exception to this rule. This book could make some ministers twice as effective.

PAUL WOOLLEY

Facing Decay

The American Sex Revolution, by Pitirim A. Sorokin. Porter Sargent, Boston. $3.50.

Dr. Pitirim A. Sorokin is Chairman of the Department of Sociology of Harvard University and former President of the International Institute of Sociology. He is the author of some thirty books on sociology and is a recognized authority in his field. Thus speaks one who knows.

The thesis of The American Sex Revolution is so challenging and startling that it is well to know it is advanced by a capable authority and not by a religious reformer. Dr. Sorokin claims that the conclusions which he reaches in his American Sex Revolution are reinforced by his many works in sociology, to various ones of which he refers for the evidence to support different declarations. The deterioration of sex attitudes and mores in American life is another proof we are in the sensate state of culture, in a downward process that must be arrested by the sane leadership of this nation or our culture will go the way of that of ancient Egypt, of Greece and of Rome. The student who is familiar with Sorokin’s The Crisis of Our Age will follow the application of Sorokin’s cyclical view of history to morals in the American cultural pattern.

Birth, marriage and death are declared to be the most important events of an individual life and, as viewed by society, of more importance than other events because of the way they are hedged in by laws, mores and traditions. Of these three, marriage is by far the most important because it is the transition from the child to the wife-mother or to the husband-father. The family becomes the most important school for the child, it fulfills the creative urge in humanity, it secures immortality for the individual and the race and it satisfies the demand for fellowship. No illicit sexual relationship can do what the family relationship can do. Sex viewed in the responsible relationship of the family is a healthy and helpful experience, ennobled and beautified in the language of Sociologist Sorokin; but sex in extra-marital relationships or pre-marital relationships or without discipline and control is viewed as a crime, a sin and a symptom of degeneration. Recognizing this, Sorokin declares that a revolution is taking place in the American way of life pertaining to sex. He gives the evidence in the preponderant practice of pre-marital sex relationships and the increasing number of extra-marital sex relations that are resulting in divorce, desertion, orphanaging of millions of children, illegitimate children, abortions, the skyrocketing of the sale of contraceptives and the resultant physical and mental diseases. The statistics presented by Professor Sorokin are impressive. It is his belief that sex promiscuity leads to sex addiction, that such addiction is encouraged by sex reaching its saturation point in pulp magazines, in realistic novels, in the entertainment field of the legitimate stage, the movies and television, in newspapers, in bathing beauty contests, in advertising of every article of life, in present legal practices and enactments and even in science. This, joined with the weakening of taboos on promiscuity in sex by religious, legal and social authorities, has resulted in the present revolution.

Professor Sorokin boldly proclaims that this revolution is having its effect upon the deterioration of physical health of our nation, the increase of mental tensions and derangements, the reduction of creativity, the interference with longevity, the breakup of integrity and the destruction of happiness. He shows that mental illnesses increase proportionately with the sex freedoms. This sex freedom produces tension in the life of the individual in his relationship to his spouse, or to the relatives of the person with whom he has had relations, and with society. These tensions tend to increase and have a disintegrating effect upon society itself.

Out of his vast knowledge of and familiarity with the history of past civilizations, Professor Sorokin demonstrates that the same process took place in the old kingdom and middle kingdom of Egypt, in the change from a strict and puritanical family life to one of freedom, to one of license. He believes that the rigorous restraints upon sex in the family life of the puritanical period result in a creative burst of life. Simultaneous with the creative burst of life the restraints are released, then within two generations they become license, and the culture begins to deteriorate. Proof is also adduced from the history of Greece, of Rome, of Italy and of modern Europe. Sorokin believes that America has passed through this cycle of continence, of creativity, of freedom, of looseness and is now facing decay. He believes that inevitable doom awaits this nation without a moral regeneration in the form of sex continence. To assist the transition from sex anarchy to sex order, he advocates the practice of total love, in pre-marital relations, in courtship and in marriage. Sex-love is only a small part of the total love of human beings. Sorokin challenges present leadership to change society by changing persons, changing practices of our culture and changing institutions.

Here is a magnificent negative preparation for the Christian Gospel standard of morals, teaching on sex and transformation by the power of God. Professor Sorokin has done America a great service to analyze the trend of our present society, to raise warning signals and to summon the nation back to standards of purity. Christians will rejoice in the thesis of the book and will agree, at least 95%, with the book which is not particularly written from a Christian standpoint.

HAROLD JOHN OCKENGA

Social Implications

All Ye That Labor, by Lester De Koster. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids. $1.50.

This book, which bears the subtitle, “An Essay on Christianity, Communism and the Problem of Evil,” contrasts the approach of Christianity with that of communism, as religions, to the problem of social evil. It compares in a delightfully effective way the explanations these two systems offer to the existence of an imperfect world, effectively criticizing the explanation of Communism.

All Ye That Labor is the first of a series of monographs, called Pathway Books, which Eerdmans intends to issue on important subjects within the general province of the Christian faith. From Authority to Archaeology, the Pathway series will offer the best available evangelical thought on questions of current religious interest. If the others compare favorably with this first volume, the series will be a valuable one.

The author takes his departure from the assumption that Western man has surrendered his dreams of utopia and is once again engaged in a quest for an explanation of the malignancy he recognizes in society. Point by point he contrasts Communism’s affirmation that man will inevitably save himself with Christianity’s supreme affirmation that God can save man. He finds that Marx’s insights (for instance, that society is sick, a conclusion reached during a period of universal optimism) do not necessarily validate the conclusions drawn therefrom. He establishes, in telling fashion, that man, nature and God are not what Marx thought them to be and that evil is not simply the result of ignorance and of ancestry, inevitably destined to disappear in a classless society.

The author defends but does not worship Capitalism. He acknowledges that Capitalism produces social evil, but he insists that the source of the evil is not in the system but in human sin. This is a profound insight frequently missed by critics who assume that the problem may always he found in the system itself and who look for the evils of Capitalism in its premises rather than in man. On the other hand, argues the author. Communism is wrong as a system, and in the hands of sinful man the evil is compounded. Capitalism is based upon premises that are essentially good and benevolent. It produces evil only as human greed and selfishness add their corrupting influence to a philosophy which otherwise would offer freedom and defend the individual without destroying natural differences.

This book, despite its economic theme, is a masterful apology for the Christian view of man, sin and salvation. It also constitutes a strong argument for the fact that Christianity has social implications. The author’s insights are frequently profound. They are generally phrased in simple and delightful language.

Untreated, however, are at least two important considerations. The first, how human greed and selfishness form the dynamic of Communism instead of an impersonal dialectical materialism. The author declares that Communism’s dynamic is demonic, but he doesn’t point out how this dynamic is, in action, man’s selfish search to improve himself at the expense of those who allegedly exploit him. Secondly, the book says nothing of the relation (if any) of Democracy to either of the systems discussed. Most Americans, at any rate, assume that some form of Democracy inevitably complements Capitalism. At least a statement affirming or denying this assumption would have been helpful.

G. AIKEN TAYLOR

Strong Meat

Red Dragon Over China, by Harold H. Martinson. Augsburg, Minneapolis, 1956. $3.50.

This is a book which should not be read by those who would like to ignore or forget the political ineptness or worse, that permitted China to fall into the Communist Camp. Nor should it be read by those who contend that the unrepentance of sins and atrocities of communism should be overlooked. This book is strong meat. It revolts because it is true. It depresses because it gives the downward course of a great and once friendly nation and tells of the agonies of her people after their “liberation.”

The author was born in China and after receiving his education in America returned to the land of his birth as a Christian missionary. He is not a fanatic but an honest reporter of facts. He does not write of his opinions but of tragic happenings. He writes with care and documents his statements with a generous bibliography.

Mr. Martensen states in his preface: “This book is presented to the public more from a sense of duty than from a sense of choice. Having witnessed at close hand the workings of communism, I feel constrained as a Christian to inform, to warn, to arouse as many as possible against this terrifying blight.”

“In all my research I have not come across a single satisfactory survey of the rise of communism in China.”

With a thoroughness and a clarity that satisfies even though the details are so utterly depressing, the author proceeds to give a running account of communism’s take-over of China. After the establishing of the red regime he proceeds to give case histories in a chronological order of repressions, brain washings and wholesale murder.

One pathetic illustration is an actual photograph of a great throng of people kneeling just prior to their execution. Their one crime was that they had owned a little land.

Here in the peace and quiet of America there is danger of being lulled into a feeling of security, or of feeling that the evil days and ways of the communists have passed. That we have been spared the horrors of war and wholesale atrocities is soon forgotten.

Red Dragon Over China brings one back with a jerk. We see communism for what it was when China was lost to the free world. We see it as it is today. This book should be read by politicians, by church leaders and by any misguided Americans who feel that one can do business with either the system or the adherents of communism.

L. NELSON BELL

Enough Of Barth

Christ and the Conscience, by N. H. G. Robinson, D.Litt., Professor of Systematic Theology, University of St. Andrews, Nisbet & Co. London.

The purpose of this book is difficult to define. The author has quite clear views of his own, and it would have been most welcome to his readers if he had expounded these positively and constructively. Instead of this valuable exposition the reader is supplied with yet another book on Barth. Interesting and stimulating though Barth is, have we not enough of him? The present reviewer would much rather be reading Dr. Robinson in Dr. Robinson’s book. Barth, Brunner and Niebuhr are all weighed in the balances by our author and found wanting! Dr. P. T. Forsyth is shown on this occasion, as on many others, to have been a fore-runner of Barth’s spiritual emphasis but at the same time to have been far more scriptural and certainly far less paradoxical.

The author’s main concern is to draw attention to the absence of the truly ethical element in Barthianism. He contends that theology must take within its sphere not only the setting forth of the truth about the Divine communication of revelation, but also those truths which belong to man’s reception of that revelation. “Theology cannot escape the responsibility of considering the response to revelation as well as the revelation itself.”

Dr. Robinson does not like Barth’s contention that “the response of faith is utterly given” as a kind of creatio ex nihilo. Dr. Robinson argues rightly that Barthianism is evangelically deficient in that it either pays no heed to the realm of man’s moral action or even violates its sanctity. He writes, “Underlying the movement way from Barth by those closest to him there is at bottom … a desire and a search for a more ethical evangelical theology, and theological presentation of the Gospel which does not violate, not indeed the moral realm to which the Gospel is sent, but the larger moral realm to which it belongs, the realm of God’s grace summoning man to salvation.”

Dr. Robinson’s work is valuable in its avowed “preliminary but indispensable task” of defining and defending the standpoint of ethico-evangelical theology. May it be hoped that, the preliminaries being completed, the author will proceed with the development of his own contribution.

ERNEST F. KEVAN

The Good Life

Christian Personal Ethics, by Carl F. H. Henry. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1957. $6.95.

This book is an important contribution to the literature of moral philosophy, and especially to formulations from the point of view of religious faith as it is affirmed in the Bible. It includes an extensive and thorough exposition of systems of speculative moral philosophies together with a penetrating evaluation of their merits and their inadequacies. It argues that “the impotence and sterility of speculative ethics derive largely from a self-enforced segregation from the ethics of revelation.”

The fairness with which the author states philosophies is one of the praiseworthy features of this fine book. Another such feature is the clarity of its style and the consistency of its thesis that “ethical ideas underlie the whole” of the Bible and “are capable of systematic presentation.” The author of this book has indeed achieved such a systematization in an admirable and convincing manner.

This book is a scholarly, yet easily understood argument in support of the conviction that “Christian ethics is the ethics of … redemptive religion.” It should be included in the small but indispensable library of ministers, theological students and college students who are interested in studies of religion and in philosophies of religion. This book is strongly recommended for courses in Christian ethics.

BEN KIMPEL

Europe News, March 4, 1957

Mission In Berlin

A lot of violent history has unfolded around the City Mission in Berlin, scheduled to celebrate its 80th anniversary this month with evangelistic services led by outstanding speakers.

The Mission was founded by Hofprediger Pastor D. Adolf Stoecker in 1877.

Pastor Wilhelm Brauer is now director of the Mission.

‘Without Parallel’

A lot of spiritual indifference has passed under the bridge in Norway, but a visitor can’t tell it these days.

Congregational visitation campaigns, patterned after American methods and described as “without parallel in Norwegian Church history,” are bringing new life to churches.

In Oslo, during one week, 1,200 church members visited 20,000 homes. In the district of Rogaland, about 40,000 homes were visited.

The motto—“Bring Christ to the people and the people to Christ.”

French Version

A guitar-strumming priest has become France’s version of Elvis Presley.

The Rev. Aime Duval’s latest album of records is a best seller and he will headline a show at the Gaumont Palace Cinema in Paris this month.

The priest sings gay hymns to catchy rhythm tunes used as dance music.

Deaths

The Rev. Dr. Clarence E. Macartney, 77, pastor emeritus of Pittsburgh’s First Presbyterian Church, noted author and contributing editor of CHRISTIANITY TODAY; February 20.

Mrs. William “Ma” Sunday, 88, widow of famed evangelist “Billy” Sunday, in Phoenix, Arizona, also on February 20.

Dr. John Elward Brown Sr., 77, founder of John Brown University at Siloam Springs, Ark.

Dr. Everett Carleton Herrick, 80, president emeritus of Andover Newton Theological School, Andover, Mass.

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