9. The consequences of denying the inspiration of Holy Scriptures.
Although the older modern theologians, such as Kahnis, Luthardt, and others, denied the inspiration and therefore the infallibility of Scripture, they declared that besides this the Protestant principle of the sole authority of Scripture must be adhered to. Nothing should be placed above Scripture as the norm in matters of Christian doctrine. Scripture must remain the "ultimate norm" of Christian knowledge and doctrine. Thus Kahnis wrote: 1018) "Protestantism stands and falls with the principle of the sole authority of Scripture. Independent of this principle is the doctrine of inspiration of the dogmatists." They were countered at the time from several quarters on this side and on the other side of the ocean that there was self-deception here. If the
1017) St. L. 1. 1055; XXII, 544. 1069.
1018) Der innere Gang des deutschen Protestantismus 2, p. 241; in Baier-Walther 1, 103.
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Protestant theologian, who according to his "consciousness of faith" or "Christian ego" has to make the distinction between truth and error, is necessarily made the last and highest norm within Protestantism and placed above the Scriptures. This degradation of Scripture to a norma normata was then also soon carried out quite universally and declared to be the only correct thing. Thus, for example, Seeberg, claiming to have used the "testimony of Christ and his salvation" in Scripture as a correction of the Scriptural word, and even ascribing this procedure to Luther, writes: "Considered in this way, Scripture must not be coordinated to itself as the second principle1019) of Protestantism to justifying faith. The driving principle is faith. And in that only faith understands Scripture and it is there only for faith, it [Scripture] is to be subordinated to it [faith] as the principle.1020) We see here what Protestantism becomes when it abandons the truth that Scripture is God's infallible Word. Protestantism's principle "of the sole authority of Scripture" is completely abandoned. The divine order in the Church is turned upside down. According to this, the faith of Christians is no longer based on Scripture, on the word of the apostles and prophets, but vice versa: Scripture, the word of the apostles and prophets, is based on faith. Protestantism has degenerated into the most consummate enthusiasm, such as we encounter in Quakerism. We point back to Robert Barclay, the Quaker dogmatist, who also says of the Scriptures that they are not to be regarded as an "adequate first rule of faith and life," but only as "a second rule subordinate to the Spirit" (regula secundaria, subordinata Spiritui). The "last refuge" and "the certain and immovable foundation of the whole Christian faith" is not Holy Scriptures, but the inner, immediate revelation of the Holy Spirit, which carries its certainty in itself.1021)
With Barclay, Seeberg agrees completely in the words quoted above. He only sets for Barclay's "inner,
1019) Highlighted by Seeberg himself.
1020) Highlighted by us.
1021) Note 907, p. 330.
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immediate revelation", to which the Scriptures are "subordinated" as the first rule, the "faith" as the second rule. Nowadays it is no longer quite fashionable to address "inner, immediate revelations". And with Seeberg agrees in principle and mostly in expression the whole of modern theology, in so far as it denies the inspiration of Scripture. It is not Scripture that is the source and norm of faith, but faith that is the source and norm of theology.
With the denial of the inspiration of the Scriptures, the situation is as follows: 1. we renounce the knowledge of the Christian truth, and in place of the knowledge of the Christian truth, human imagination and ignorance takes its place. For if any man teach otherwise, and abide not in the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ, which we have in the word of his prophets and apostles, he is darkened, and knoweth nothing, but is sick (νοσών, lieth down sick) in questions and strife of words.1022) If, in denying the inspiration of Scripture, we are not wholly lost in human opinion and ignorance, it is because we still hold matters of the truth revealed in Scripture in contradiction with our principally false position. We renounce faith in the Christian sense, because Christian faith always takes place only vis-a-vis the Word of God. It comes from the sermon, but the sermon comes from the Word of God.1023) 3) We renounce prayer because Christian prayer presupposes abiding in Christ's words. "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you."1024) 4. We renounce the overcoming of death. "If any man keep my word, he shall not see death for ever." 1025) 5, We renounce the means of mission of the Christian Church, which is to teach the nations all that Christ commanded His Church to teach. He who does not bring the doctrines of Christ shall not be considered or treated as a Christian teacher..1026) 6. We renounce the right Christian unity of the Church, which
1022) 1 Tim. 6:3-4; Jn. 8:31-32; 17:20.
1023) Rom. 10:17.<w:t>1024) Jn. 15:7.
1025) Jn. 8:51.<w:t>1026) Matt. 28:19;<w:t>2 Jn. 9-10.
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consists in faith in Christ's Word.1027) Luther:1028) "The word and doctrines shall make Christian unity and fellowship." 7 We abstain from intercourse with God because God remains invisible to us men in this life and approaches us only through the means of His Word. Those who do not merely intercourse with God through the means of His Word, perverse only with their own human thoughts, with "projections of their human ego."1029) 8. We turn the Christian religion, which is a wisdom from above, a σοφία ϑεον, which never came into a man's heart, a secret, which was concealed from the world, but now revealed through the prophets' writings by command of the eternal God1030) — we turn this wisdom from above into a wisdom from below, by wanting to let men decide what in the writings of the apostles and prophets is God's truth and what is not, what in it is to be accepted and what in it is to be rejected. We break off the divine ladder to heaven, the bridge and the footbridge that binds heaven to this earth. In short, everything that makes us Christians and sustains us as Christians we abandon in principle when we fall away from the truth that the Holy Scriptures are God's own infallible Word by inspiration.
Walther therefore wrote in 1886, one year before his death, on the occasion of the attempt of modern theologians to make Luther the protector of their "free" position on the Scriptures, among other things as follows:1031) "Supposing Luther had really considered the Bible to be a book afflicted with all kinds of errors, from which only the scholars could peel out the divine core of truth, then only Luther would be taken away from the Bible Christians. The most frightening thing is that the modern believers and modern Lutheran theologians (as it seems almost without exception!) declare it to be a fact, which can no longer be denied, that the Scriptures, besides the "own good thoughts" of their authors, also contain "hay, straw and stubble", which "consumes the fire". That stand robs the Bible Christians not only of a man whom they had heretofore regarded as a faithful witness of the truth, but the Bible Christians are deprived of their very Bible, their lamp and light on their
1027) Jn. 8:31-32; Matt. 28:19; Eph. 4:5.
1028) St. L. IX, 831.<w:t>1029) 1 Cor. 13:12; 1 Tim. 6:3-4.
1030) 1 Cor. 2:9; Rom. 16:25-26 1031) L. and W. 1886, p. 76 f.
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their way to eternity, their rod and staff in the dark valley of affliction, in short, God's Word and with it their comfort in the anguish of sin, their hope in the night of their hour of death, taken away! ... We must say of the so-called 'divine-human Scripture' as it is now understood and taught by modern faithful theology: Beware, beware, I say, of this 'divine-human Scripture'! It is the devil's mask, because it finally leads to such a Bible, according to which I would not like to be a Bible Christian, namely that the Bible henceforth is no more than another good book, which I must read with constant serious examination, in order not to fall into error. For if I believe that the Bible also contains errors, it is no longer a touchstone for me, but needs one itself. In short, it is unspeakable what the devil seeks with the 'divine-human Scripture'."