Modern Skepticism: A Course of Lectures Delivered at the Request of the Christian Evidence Society
Religion
Modern Skepticism: A Course of Lectures Delivered at the Request of the Christian Evidence Society
Church of England; Skepticism; Skepticism -- Controversial literature
In the case now before us, however, we have to deal with a converse
position. There are four Epistles in the New Testament which have been
admitted on all hands to be the veritable productions of the Apostle
Paul. These are the two Epistles to Corinth, the Epistle to the Church
at Rome, and the Epistle to the Galatians. The writers, if any, who
have ventured to call in question the authenticity of these Epistles
are so few, and so insignificant, as to be unworthy of mention. We may
safely pass them by without fear of challenge or dispute. There is
absolutely no room for any reasonable doubt that we have in our hands
in these four letters the true and genuine compositions of Saul of
Tarsus, after he had become a Christian.
It will be my business, then, on the present occasion, to examine and
weigh the precise value of this admission of authenticity, which can
only be spoken of as universally made. What is the evidence in support
of Christianity which can be fairly adduced from it? In endeavouring
to estimate the nature and amount of this evidence, I shall not assume
these Epistles to be what we commonly understand by inspired. I shall
regard them only as the natural human productions of a certain man
whose personal history, to a considerable extent, can be discovered
from them. If, on internal or other grounds, there is cause to believe
they have any higher authority, that will be another matter. But we
shall not assume it in dealing with them. Our aim in the first place
must simply be to inquire what the acceptance of these four Epistles
as the work of St. Paul legitimately demands of us; what are the
inferences fairly deducible from their statements; what insight
they give us into the character and motives of the writer, and what
information they convey as to the nature and constitution of the early
Christian society to which they were addressed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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