This is the title, in its briefest form, of a volume just published by H. L. Hastings, the well-known editor of The Christian, Boston. The body of the work is a review of Kuenen's "Religion of Israel," and a "Study of the Pentateuch," with reference to the single question: Is the Pentateuch as old as the time of Moses? by Rufus P. Stebbins, late president of Meadville [99] Theological Seminary. This is preceded by three preliminary essays from the pen of Dr. Hastings, occupying eighty-four pages; and it is followed by another from the same author under the title, "The Wonderful Law," covering 118 pages.

      I have had time to examine only the three preliminary essays; but I can freely say that these alone make the book of great value. If the other parts are equal to it, the whole volume must be one of the best of its size that has been published on higher criticism.

      H. L. Hastings is well known both in this country and in Great Britain, as one of the most aggressive and witty writers on subjects of this kind now living. His part in this volume, like the various tracts which he has published and circulated very extensively, are full of happy hits, telling illustrations and withering sarcasm. He is well posted on the topics which he touches, so that he knows the weak points in the armor of his adversaries, and the sharp point of his lance never misses its aim. In this respect he differs from some who have undertaken to write against destructive criticism with but a dim conception as to what it is.

      I can not give so correct a conception of his part of this book by my own words, as by quoting from it some specimen passages. If the destructive critics were really philanthropists, seeking to dethrone superstition, and to give men enlightened views respecting sacred books which they are likely to reverence to their own injury, it would seem that they should begin their work where superstition is the most extreme, and the people most need the enlightening influence of criticism. Especially should they begin with the books which are leading astray the largest portion of the human race. But instead of this course, which real philanthropy would [100] dictate, they devote all of their critical powers to the destruction of faith in just one little book, which is held in esteem by only a small portion of the race, and which is certainly doing little harm to those who believe in it. Our author deals with this question in the following passage, which, besides setting forth the point in question, contains so much valuable information as to justify the space it will occupy:

      For instance, they might examine the Rig Veda, the foundation of Brahminism, containing 1,028 hymns, averaging ten stanzas each. They might extend their examination to the code of Manu, comprised in some twenty big law-books, and dating back to B. C. 400 or 500. They might investigate the story of Ramayana, that most sacred poem of twenty-four thousand verses, of which it is said that whoever reads it or hears it will be freed from all sin. They might examine the Maha-Charata, a poem Of 220,000 lines, or seven times as long as the Iliad and Odyssey combined, a copy of it filling eight good-sized volumes. Or they might turn, for a change, to the Upanishads, "the kernel of the Vedas," a series of mystical Hindu books "that no man can number;" one hundred and fifty of which have been catalogued, some of them comprising hundreds of pages. Or they might study the Puranas, or Hindu traditional stories, which date from A. D. 600 down, of which there are eighteen Maha or principal Puranas, containing 1,600,000 lines, and other minor Puranas, containing about as many more. There were, the Hindu sages tell us, a billion lines, but the rest were mercifully kept in heaven for home consumption.

      Having examined all these sacred books, which are held by their votaries to be far superior to anything contained in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, they might turn to the Chinese "Cyclopedia of Ancient and Modern Literature" with its 6,109 volumes, including eighteen volumes of index; and having spent six or eight years learning the ten thousand different Chinese characters in common use, and fifteen or twenty years in learning to read the language fluently, they might, with the aid of the latest "Imperial Dictionary," containing 43,960 characters, go through these publications, and subject them to the critical tests of the higher criticism. When this was done, they might visit [101] the British Museum and turn their attention to the Jangyn, or "Cyclopedia of Thibetan Buddhism"--a delightful little work comprised in 225 volumes, each two feet long and six inches thick. These--which are held to be fully equal, if not superior, to the Hebrew Scriptures, by some of the skeptics of the present day who know little of either--would furnish a very inviting field for the exercise of the critical faculty. And so long as the vast multitudes of China, India and Thibet accept and embrace these wonderful productions, receiving them with unquestioning faith, it would certainly seem quite proper for men of critical and philanthropic inclinations to investigate the pretensions of these remarkable volumes, and inform the multitudes who accept them as to their authenticity, inerrancy and authority.

      It is a remarkable fact that the higher critics of the present day have hitherto failed to thoroughly explore these vast and inviting fields, but have mainly devoted their attention to the examination and discussion of sixty-six little, insignificant pamphlets, the sacred literature of a small, isolated, scattered and persecuted nation, which in numbers is positively insignificant in comparison with the vast multitudes which accept the voluminous sacred books we have mentioned. And it is a somewhat remarkable fact that this mighty mass of Assyrian, Babylonian, Chinese, Hindu and Thibetan sacred literature escapes criticism, and sometimes receives actual commendation, while the only documents which are especially criticized and whose errancy and mythical and unhistorical character is pointed out with unsparing zeal, are the records and laws of a nation which has had no political existence for nearly two thousand years, which does not control or possess a government, a city, a country, or even an island, on the face of the earth. Why this book, of all others, should be subjected to such criticism as no other book has ever endured, and why this must run the gauntlet and receive the blows of friends and foes, while a vast mass of sacred and Oriental literature passes unnoticed and unscathed, is a phenomenon which baffles the comprehension of ordinary minds.

      But we have to deal with existing facts; and as the higher critics of the present day do not trouble themselves to explain, dissect and subject to microscopic examination the sacred writings, traditions and theories of the hundreds of millions which compose the vast majority of the human family; and as they do [102] not trouble themselves to point out the inconsistencies, discrepancies and errancies of those books, we are limited to a much narrower range in the consideration of the performances of the higher critics, whose sphere of action by their own choice is thus circumscribed and limited. . . .

      The fact that these critics themselves learned all they know of criticism and science, in schools, colleges and universities which exist only under the light and influence of this book, and that most of them depend for the leisure they enjoy, the libraries they explore, the salaries they receive, and the bread that they eat, upon foundations and institutions endowed and loved by men who reverenced these very writings--might itself inspire a degree of reverential deference for such venerable documents; and the fact that these same critics, if born in any land where these writings are unknown, might have been exposed in the fields, flung out into the city streets, or drowned in the nearest horsepond before they had time to criticize anything, would seem at least a sufficient reason why they would undertake with candor and respectful consideration the examination of a book to the influence of which they may owe their very existence, or without which they might to-day have been howling and whirling in some circles of Dervishes, or sitting besmeared with cow dung on the banks of the Ganges, and seeking purification and salvation amid the obscenities and idolatries of heathen lands (pp. 10-12).

      The unsuspecting eagerness with which some young men swallow the conclusions of the unfriendly critics, as young birds in the nest swallow the worms and insects brought by the mother bird, is set forth in the following passage:

      There are signs of the existence of a mortal fear among some of the younger students of theology that in the rapid progress of scientific criticism they may be left behind. They have heard about Galileo and Copernicus, the decrees and anathemas of councils, bulls against comets, and similar instances of "religious" bigotry, until--forgetting that these were simply instances of old science disputing the claims of new science, a phenomenon which occurs continually--they have determined that nobody shall get the start of them in the race [103] of modern scientific investigation. Hence, whatever assertions or demands a scientist or a critic may make, they hasten to accept his statements and obey his behests. But this plan of unconditional surrender may be carried too far; and when men believe everything that scientific men have guessed at, and admit and indorse the vagaries of scientific visionaries, before even their inventors and authors are satisfied of their truth, they remind one of the mythical 'coon which Davy Crockett treed, and which, on learning who the hunter was, said: "Colonel, you need not fire, I will come down." It is not best for men to part with their common sense, or lose their balance for fear of being laughed at a thousand years hence. It is safe to hasten slowly. Everything that can be shaken will be shaken, but some things that can not be shaken will remain; and it is possible that there will be, after all the whirlwinds of criticism, some things which can not be shaken; and the only way to find out what they are is to wait and investigate, and see.

      A story is told of a lunatic who, finding his way into a crowded church and grasping one of the pillars supporting the gallery, said: "I am going to pull the house down!" Timid women screamed and shouted, but an old minister calmed the tumult by calling out: "Let him try! let him try!" So there are men who are perfectly willing to have the critics try their hands at the Bible, and will abide the results. If they can grind it to powder, let them do so; if they grind themselves to powder, it will only be another instance of the rat gnawing the file (pp. 14, 15).

[SEBC 99-104]