IS.Chapter4.docx

CHAPTER FOUR THE RELATION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT TO THE AMANUENSES 1. THE COMMAND TO WRITE THE dogmaticians teach that inspiration includes an impulse and a command of God to write. They held this in contrast to the Roman Catholic theologians of their day who taught that Scripture was written by God’s w...

CHAPTER FOUR THE RELATION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT TO THE AMANUENSES 1. THE COMMAND TO WRITE THE dogmaticians teach that inspiration includes an impulse and a command of God to write. They held this in contrast to the Roman Catholic theologians of their day who taught that Scripture was written by God’s will and by His inspiration but denied that there was a command to write. It was in the interest of unwritten tradition that the Catholics denied a mandatum scribendi. They maintained that there was no difference between the written Word of God, which was Scripture, and the unwritten Word, which was tradition. Both derived their authority from the Church. According to this teaching the Church and the Pope were, in the last analysis, placed above Scripture. The Church could exist without Scripture but not without the Pope, who was divinely appointed by Christ. Against these claims of Rome the Lutherans held that Scripture was written by a command of God, and that by virtue of its inspiration. To the Lutherans it was impossible to speak of inspiration if the apostles did not write by divine command.1 In the act of inspiration there was a divine and an inner impulse, according to 2 Pet. 1. 21. This impulse of the Spirit is itself a command which differs in no way from an expressed external command.2 The dogmaticians do not contend that there was necessarily an external command to write. According to the passage given above, holy men of God wrote not of their own free will but, being moved by the Spirit of God, according to His divine will, and this will of God constituted a divine command, not an external command but a command nevertheless. Thus the divine activation in the act of inspiration is, in fact, an internal, hidden command of God to write.1 Yet the mandatum scribendi was not merely a general command to write, inspiration rules out such an idea. Not only the things to be written but the Scriptures themselves were commanded by God.2 There was then a definite command given to the whole school of apostles, a command to teach all nations (Matt. 28. 19). This command to teach was to be carried out by way of writing as well as by preaching. That writing is included in this command is indicated by the following promise of verse 20. Evangelization viva voce without a written word would soon be impossible for the apostles. A half century of preaching could never reach the ends of the earth. Therefore a commission of this nature to teach all nations carries with it a command to write, even though this command is not specific. ‘Wo der Apostolische Fuess nicht hingelanget, da ist der Apostolische Sendbrief hinkommen.’ 3 The office of the apostles to testify of Christ comprised writing as well as preaching (Acts 10. 42). This is seen from the fact that the apostles regarded their writings as testimonies of things which were to be made known (Jn. 21. 24). It was for the benefit of future generations and for those in remote places that they wrote, and for such people they wrote the same message as they preached to those about them while they were living (1 Jn. 1. 1).4 The apostles would not have dared to speak without divine authority; much less would they have written without a command from God. Peter thought it wrong to announce the Gospel to the Gentiles without a divine command (Acts 10. 19, 26).1 There are, of course, many special commands to write recorded in Scripture. However, from the fact that these books were written in response to a specific command it does not follow that those books for the writing of which there was no command recorded in Scripture were written without a divine command. In fact, the very opposite is the case.2 The papists involve themselves in a contradiction when they say that Scripture was written according to God’s will but not according to His command. Quenstedt 3 points out this fact. He argues: ‘An expressed command was not needful because the inspiration of things to be written and the inner urge to write constitute a command. It involves a contradictio in adjecto to maintain that the apostles wrote by the will, inspiration and suggestion of God but not by His command.’ God not only approves the writing of Scripture; He wills Scripture to be written. And this will constitutes a command. Voluntas Dei instar mandati est.4 If the Scriptures were not written by a divine command they are neither divine nor inspired. Could anyone, even an apostle, claim that his writings were divinely inspired and at the same time imply that he wrote without a divine command ? 5 The papists only confuse the issue by talking of an expressed external command. No one has ever contended that Scripture was written in accordance with such a command. The Lutherans speak only of an inner command which is joined with the act of inspiration. This ‘hidden command’ is nothing more than an excitatio divina, imperans scriptionem, imo & eadem procreans.6 But what about the external occasions which brought about the books of the Bible? Do they not argue against a mandatum Dei? Not at all, for the occasions which prompted the writings were not accidental but divinely directed according to the wisdom of God. In like manner, study and research on the part of the amanuenses do not rule out a mandatum scribendi but argue for it, inasmuch as such investigation was undertaken under the guidance of the Spirit of God.1 2. THE INSTRUMENTALITY OF THE WRITERS’ OFFICE What was the relation between the Holy Spirit and the writers? That they were inspired means that the holy writers wrote by an inner revelation and suggestion.2 It means that they underwent a peculiar inbreathing, impulse and urge of the Holy Spirit,3 a certain supernatural and extraordinary enlightenment of the mind,4 a unique urge upon the will to write.5 The dogmaticians describe the writers as writing by the influxus.6 afflatus,7 jussus & mandatum, ductus & impulsus,8, suggestio, inspiratio & dictamen,9 inspiratio & instinctus 10 of the Spirit. The holy men are said to be moved to write, that is, acti, duett, impulsi, inspirati & gubernati, by the Holy Spirit.11 All the words of Scripture were written at the dictation of God.12 Although men took part in the writing of Scripture God is the real author of the Scriptures and the one who has dictated them.13 The prophets and apostles were subordinate authors,14 they were merely the organs of God,1 the hands of Christ,2 the hands and penmen of the Holy Spirit,3 the amanuenses, tabelliones, notarii and actuarii of the Spirit of God.4 They were simply the means God employed in putting His Word into writing. In scholastic terminology, God is the causa efficiens principalis scripturae and the apostles and prophets the causa efficiens instrumentalis. What was the part these causae instrumentales played in the writing of Scripture? Gerhard answers: 5 ‘The instrumental causes of the holy Scripture were holy men of God, men called and chosen by God in a unique and immediate manner to this end, that they write divine revelations. Such men were the prophets in the Old Testament and the evangelists and apostles in the New Testament, men whom we therefore correctly call God’s amanuenses, the hands of Christ, the secretaries and notaries of the Holy Spirit, since they did not speak or write according to their own human will but were , prompted, moved, incited, inspired and governed by the Holy Spirit. They wrote not as men but as men of God, that is, as servants of God and special organs of the Holy Spirit.’ This statement expresses the sentiments of all the dogmaticians in reference to the relation of the Spirit to the amanuenses. Scripture is not the word of men, except in reference to its so-called materia ex qua, but the Word of very God, so that it is perfectly proper to say, ‘The Holy Spirit speaks to us in and through Scripture. Therefore we are to look to the very words of Scripture for the Word and thoughts of the Holy Spirit.’ 6 This conception of the relation between the Spirit and the penmen is monergistic. Scripture was not brought about by the will of men, nor even by the co-operation of men.1 As instruments and amanuenses of the Spirit the writers could write nothing except what was dictated to them. Scripture is God’s book: He alone has caused it to be written. Although He employed men as tools, and although He chose to write His word in no other way than by means of these penmen, still these tools played no principal part in writing God’s Word. Scripture is not man’s but God’s Word. To be sure, men participated in writing Scripture, but not in such a way that they became co-authors with God.2 Scripture was not written partly by God and partly by men so that a joint human-divine product resulted. If such were the case it could no longer be called the Word of God.3 As in the case of the ten commandments the Scriptures were written, so to speak, with the finger of God, in that He used and possessed the hearts and all the faculties of the amanuenses.4 Therefore the dogmaticians do not shrink from saying that God Himself wrote the Scriptures.5 Hutter 6 explains how this may be said: ‘God Himself is the principal author of Scripture. Therefore even if God did not immediately write the Scripture but deigned to employ the pen and service of the prophets and apostles, still nothing is thereby subtracted from the authority of Scripture. For it is God and God alone who inspired in the prophets and apostles both what they were to speak and what they were to write, and He used their mouths, their tongues, their hands and pens. In such a manner Scripture as such was written by God Himself; the prophets and apostles were merely His organs.’ 7 When the dogmaticians attribute the authorship of Scripture exclusively to God and call the apostles and prophets amanuenses, letter-writers and clerks of the Holy Spirit, they are merely attempting to maintain the instrumentality of their office. This significant fact is pointed out by Quenstedt when he says that the writers of Scripture regarded themselves merely as instruments which could not work unless they were moved by God, as amanuenses who should write nothing unless it was dictated to them. Quenstedt maintains that the prophets and apostles contributed nothing to the writing of Scripture except their speech and their pens.1 Calov is even more insistent in his emphasis upon the instrumentality of the writers of Scripture and upon the elimination of every possibility of synergism in regard to inspiration. In his Dissertationes Theologicae Rostochienses he maintains that God did not furnish the holy writers with words in such a way that they could speak and write, but in such a way that He might speak through them.2 They were no more than means through which He spoke and in whom He inspired His Word. Activated and inspired by Him they spoke, but He spoke in the same act.3 Calov writes: 4 ‘The Holy Spirit has imparted the Word to the prophets and apostles. Hence the mystery of Christ is said to be “revealed unto the holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit” (Eph. 3. 5), and “the Spirit of Christ which was in the prophets testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow, and the apostles preached the Gospel through the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven” (1 Pet. 1. 11, 12). Now He who revealed this mystery to the prophets and apostles, He who dwelt in them and announced beforehand what would happen regarding Christ, He who through the apostles preached the Gospel by which they evangelized—certainly He imparted and dictated, so to speak, the Word to the prophets and apostles and moved the prophets and apostles by inspiration and activation as Peter testifies (2 Pet. 1. 21), where he denies that prophecy came by the will of men, but on the contrary says that holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. All this means that prophecies were not human fables of human fabrication but were oracles of the Holy Spirit. They were not devised and invented by men, but inspired by the Holy Spirit in the prophets, who spoke not of their own will but from the free will and direction of the Holy Spirit.’ 1 3. MONERGISTIC INSPIRATION AND ITS IMPLICATIONS This monergistic doctrine of inspiration does not imply that God dehumanized his amanuenses and reduced them to mere mechanisms. They spoke consciously and out of understanding and experience and they wrote in the same way.2 Quenstedt very definitely says: 3 ‘We must distinguish between those who have been snatched away and are in a trance and do not know what they are doing and saying and between the apostles whom the Holy Spirit activated in such a way that they understood those things which they were speaking and writing.’ Again he writes: 4 ‘The writers are said to be , activated, incited, borne, by the Holy Spirit, not as if they were unconscious, as the enthusiasts say of themselves and as the Gentiles imagine the ecstasy in their prophets. Neither is it to be taken as if the prophets did not understand their prophecies of the things which they were to write, which was the aberration once taught by the Montanists, Phrygians, or Cataphrygians, and Priscilianists., Not only did the writers write consciously, they were enlightened intellectually and spiritually so that they understood very well what they wrote under inspiration.1 To write by inspiration of God is to write ‘immediata illuminatione intellectus.’ 2 According to Quenstedt, inspiration embraces first of all a certain supernatural and extraordinary enlightenment of the minds of the writers.3 Hollaz contends that the of the Holy Spirit involves not merely an urge to speak and write but also an illumination of the Spirit, to which is added the so-called that is, the gift of interpreting and explaining clearly the most lofty of divine mysteries.4 The amanuenses, then, not only wrote consciously but possessed a most complete understanding of what they wrote. Thus the penmen as they were led by the Holy Spirit had a special knowledge of the divine mysteries about which they wrote.5 This exceptional comprehension of spiritual matters would, of course, pertain only to , not to . We see that a mantic, Montanist conception of the relation between the Holy Spirit and the writers of Scripture is foreign to the dogmaticians, and by the later Lutheran teachers of this time, and especially by Quenstedt, is consciously and loudly condemned. This monergistic doctrine of inspiration does not imply that the amanuenses were forced to write Scripture. They wrote willingly, but not of their own free will. God made them willing penmen.1 As Christians whose wills were ruled by the Spirit of God they wrote willingly.2 They themselves chose what they would write.3 Therefore the apostles and prophets had the same purpose in writing Scripture as did God.4 God did not violate the wills and personalities of His penmen but conditioned them and made them what they were. He prepared their intellect and incited their will to write what they did.5 Quenstedt avers 6 that according to 2 Pet. 1. 19 ff Scripture was written apart from the will of man, . He means that the will of man as it functions in the natural domain, and even the regenerate will of the believer as it is incited towards good, has nothing to do with the writing of Scripture. But this, says Quenstedt, applies to the will as it is considered in a contributory sense, efficienter & originaliter. Subjectively and materially the will is active in the act of inspiration. In other words, the will of the amanuenses must not be excluded from the act of inspiration, says Quenstedt, ‘as though the amanuenses had written without and against their will, without consciousness and unwillingly; for they wrote voluntarily, willingly and knowingly.’ Psychologically the wills of the amanuenses were active when they wrote the Scriptures, although they contributed nothing of their own will to Scripture.7 This monergistic doctrine of inspiration does not imply that the amanuenses lost their identity or that they did not retain their various stylistic differences. The dogmaticians are all quick to note the dissimilarity between the penmen in their manner of writing. Baier says:1 ‘The point is well taken that the manner of speaking in the Scripture is in some places more calm and gentle, in other places more severe and forceful; again in some places it is rather plain and less ornate, in other places quite grand and ornamented. Sometimes the use of a language seems to be pure: at other times there appears to be a mixture with the idiom of other languages.’ But if each of the amanuenses retained his own individual style of writing how can the Bible be verbally inspired? This was the question asked by Erasmus, Suarez and other Catholic theologians.2 If Scripture is verbally inspired it must possess a uniform style, they said. The dogmaticians reply that in a sense Scripture has a uniform style. Its unity of subject matter makes it appear as if it were written by one author. The obvious diversity of style between the various books, written by different authors, is explained by the fact that the Holy Spirit accommodated Himself to the circumstances, abilities and natural endowments of the amanuenses; in such a way a musician might adjust himself to the various chords and tones of a musical instrument, and yet the notes which all musical instruments play are the same.1 If Cicero can write in both a grand and a humble style the Holy Spirit can do likewise.2 Feustking 3 in his typically abrupt manner answers the objection raised by the Jesuits against verbal inspiration with this argument of accommodation: Tf anyone on account of the diversity of style and different manner of expression in phraseology and style disparages the inspiration of the Scriptures, he neither knows nor rightly judges that first of all this indisputable fact must be considered, that the Spirit when he dictated the words of Scripture accommodated himself to the natural abilities of each prophet, evangelist and apostle and to their scholarship and ordinary mode of speaking.’ Quenstedt explains that the Holy Spirit could speak to us only by accommodating himself to the human mode of speaking and communication. He too maintains that there is no contradiction between a suggestio verborum and an accommodatio ordinario dicendi modo. He says: 4 ‘A distinction must be observed between the genus loquendi and the phrases, words and terms themselves. The holy writers employed the genus loquendi in daily use according to the everyday custom and meaning, and hence diversity of style arose, especially among the prophets. Now in so far as they were instructed in and accustomed to a lofty or mean style of speaking and writing the Holy Spirit chose to adjust and accommodate Himself to the natural endowments of these men, and to express the same things through some in a magnificent manner, through others in an inferior manner. The Holy Spirit accommodated Himself to the understanding and natural endowments of the holy writers in order that He might record the mysteries according to the usual mode of speaking.’ 5 4. THE DOCTRINE OF ACCOMMODATION It has been pointed out 1 that Calov does not embrace this doctrine of accommodation as it is presented by Dannhauer, Baier and Quenstedt. Calov recognizes the stylistic variations in Scripture and speaks of an accommodation of the Spirit, but he says that this accommodation, which is an act of God’s free will, does not refer to the personalities and genus loquendi of the amanuenses but to the peculiarities of the various material touched upon in the Scriptures. The statement which sets forth Calov’s views on this matter, and which seems at first glance to contradict Quenstedt’s position, reads as follows: 2 ‘The Holy Spirit, the supreme author of sacred Scripture, was not bound to the style of anyone, but, as the absolutely free master of languages, He was able through anyone to employ the method, style and mode of speech which He pleased, and He could communicate divine oracles just as easily through Jeremiah in a highly ornate style as through Isaiah in an ordinary style. Moreover, He regarded not so much the aptitude of the authors to speak as the nature of the contents which He wished to speak of. And throughout all He used His own absolute authority according to His unlimited wisdom.’ On the basis of this statement Hoenecke finds a disagreement between Calov and Quenstedt.3 He criticizes Calov and points out that the different styles of the different writers are present even when the contents of Scripture vary. Calov, however, does not state that the style in Scripture differs with respect to its content. Actually there is not so much difference between Calov and Quenstedt on this issue as one might at first suppose. Hoenecke’s strong conjecture may be due to the fact that he did not sufficiently study the context of Calov’s statement, but is more probably due to the fact that Quenstedt himself seems to think that Calov is at variance with his own view regarding the accommodation of the Spirit to His organs.1 However, Quenstedt does not criticize Calov’s presentation of the whole matter, but merely comments that Calov does not wholly share his own views. Mild as he was, Quenstedt would have expressed himself in stronger language had he felt there was any basic disagreement between himself and his colleague, but the context indicates, as Dau has aptly shown,2 that the divergence between these two representatives of the old Lutheran orthodoxy is only apparent. Calov is replying to an opponent who uses the doctrine of accommodation to argue against the common Lutheran view that the Spirit communicated to the writers the exact language in which they were to write their Scripture (‘nec docere eos linguam, in qua Prophetiam publicare debeant’). Calov simply replies that the Spirit was not bound to use a style which would have ruined the very purpose of Scripture, namely, that it be understood. And he emphasizes another kind of accommodation, an accommodation to the contents of Scripture and to the reader of Scripture. From the above statement by Calov it is wrong to conclude that he does not teach an accommodation of the Spirit to the writers of the Scriptures. Calov does teach such an accommodation. He describes it by the word , condescension. He says: 3 ‘Finally, even though it is said that the style of Scripture is clear and well suited not only to the intelligence of the readers and hearers but also to the old and accustomed manner of speech of the holy writers, still we would have to acknowledge hereby a condescension of the Holy Spirit in that He accommodated himself at times to the ordinary manner of speaking, leaving to the writers their mode of speech. And yet we must not deny that the Holy Spirit inspired in them the very words.’ Calov, then, teaches the same with regard to accommodation as Quenstedt, except that he fears such a doctrine may give occasion to a synergistic idea of inspiration. Quenstedt apparently does not share his fears, and yet he is just as careful to couch his discussion in terms which cannot be taken in a synergistic sense.1 Like Hoenecke, his student, Tholuck has drawn wrong conclusions from Calov’s discussion of accommodation. He says 2 that Calov objected to the doctrine of Musaeus which holds that the stylistic variations in Scripture were accounted for by the different characteristics of the various writers. This is not true. Calov taught that stylistic dissimilarities obtained in Scripture, and did not deny that these were due to the characteristics of the writers, although, unlike Quenstedt, he did not emphasize this idea. When Tholuck goes on to remark that Calov ignored the ‘later subterfuge’ of accommodation of the Holy Spirit he is also in error. As his above statements show, Calov was aware of this doctrine, and even taught it in a restricted manner. 5. THE QUESTION OF SOLECISMS AND BARBARISMS That the Holy Spirit employed the differing styles of the penmen in recording His Word in Scripture does not imply that there are barbarisms or Solecisms in Scripture. The dogmaticians unanimously reject the possibility of solecisms occurring in Holy Writ. They grant that the Greek of the New Testament is definitely Hellenistic and differs from the pure classical style. They grant that there are countless Hebraisms in the Scriptures of the New Testament. To be sure, the Greek of the New Testament is not polished or elegant, but it is good Greek. A departure from the conventional rule of Greek etymology and syntax, they say, is one thing; a solecism is another. The former is not necessarily based on inconsistency or ignorance. Even Augustine’s definition of a solecism as a use of a style differing from any method which has previously been generally accepted (De Doctrina Christiana, 11, 13) will not meet with their approval and cannot be predicated of Scripture, because Scripture was not written contrary to established linguistic usage.1 It was mainly Erasmus who drove the dogmaticians to defend Scripture against the charge of solecisms. He asserted that the sermons of the apostles were not only unrefined and confused but also incomplete and disturbing, and sometimes faulty in construction.2 Quenstedt disagrees. He argues 3 that Erasmus laboured under the false hypothesis that the gift of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost was only temporary, with the result that the style of the apostles was ordinarily rude and unlearned. This hypothesis was untenable for three reasons: (1) The very purpose of the gift of the Spirit was that the apostles might preach and announce the wonderful works of God throughout the whole world. (2) The hypothesis fails to distinguish between the visible signs and the things signified. The visible sign, which is the dispertitae linguae, passes away, but the thing signified, which is the gift of the Spirit, remains. (3) The aorist can only mean that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is permanent. Thus the gift of tongues remained with the apostles as long as they held their office. Hollaz maintains 4 that the possibility of solecisms is incompatible with the doctrine of verbal inspiration. Appealing to Matt. 10. 19 he remarks that if the Holy Spirit inspired the extemporaneous preaching of the apostles, not only , in regard to content, but also , in regard to their manner of speaking, certainly He suggested to them a manner of writing words which was seemly and apt in conveying meaning. Nor are there barbarisms in Scripture. A foreign word in Scripture is not necessarily a barbarism. Vocabula peregrina non statim barbarismum efficiunt. That the New Testament contains many Hebraisms, Chaldaisms and Latinisms does not automatically mean that it contains barbarisms; by such a process of argumentation any writer who uses a figure of speech drawn from a language other than his own must suffer his style to be branded barbaric. Hebraisms are essential in the writing of the New Testament, for the Old Testament is constantly echoed in the New. Nor does the fact that the apostles were called unlearned and ignorant men infer that Scripture contains solecisms and barbarisms. They were unlearned before Pentecost but not after that day. But even had they been unlearned they did not necessarily speak in solecisms.1 Even ignorant people can write coherently. Finally, it is simply not worthy of a Christian to attribute solecisms and barbarisms to Scripture. It is nothing short of blasphemy to judge God’s inspired Word by the laws of pagan literature. He who charges Scripture with solecisms and barbarisms is imputing such faults to God Himself, who has inspired and dictated the very words and phrases of Scripture.2 6. THE DOGMATICIANS AND THE MECHANICAL INSPIRATION THEORY It has been said that the scholastic Lutheran dogmaticians taught a mechanical theory of inspiration.3 If this description of their view—it is usually given in the form of an indictment— means that they held to a verbal inspiration according to which the amanuenses were efficienter and originaliter passive instruments to whom God dictated the very words to be recorded in Scripture, it is correct. If it is meant to convey the idea that the dogmaticians wished to reduce the writers of Scripture to the level of mere lifeless machines which experienced no mental activity but only moved their hands unconsciously in obedience to an irresistible impulse of the Holy Spirit, it is not in accordance with the facts in the case. It is true that Quenstedt, for instance, says that the prophets and apostles contributed nothing of their own in writing Scripture except their pens.1 But from this statement it cannot be concluded that he wishes to reduce the writers of Scripture to a state where they experienced nothing during the act of inspiration. Quenstedt himself makes this fact clear when he says in the same paragraph that the writers took up their pens consciously. Actually the mechanical idea of inspiration was not only foreign to the dogmaticians, it was loudly and consciously condemned by them. They were opposed to every conception of inspiration which would degrade the writers to the status of inanimate objects which neither thought nor felt in the act of writing but to which God imparted revelation as one might pour water into a pail. Scherzer2 says it is absurd to think of the inspired writers as inanimate instruments. The dogmaticians denied all co-operation on the part of the writers, co-operation which would make Scripture a divine-human product, but with equal resolution they affirmed that the amanuenses wrote willingly, consciously, from conviction and experience, and spontaneously.3 That they called the writers pens and hands does not mean that they wished to de-humanize the writers. These terms were employed only to emphasize their conviction that God was in fact the auctor primarius of Scripture and the apostles and prophets the means or instruments through whom God reduced His Word to writing. It is therefore strange that Luthardt represents the old Lutheran doctrine of inspiration as not considering the personal mental activity of the Biblical writers.4 Dorner renders a still more distorted view of their position when he says 1 that the scholastic Lutherans regarded the writers of Scripture as instruments which were withdrawn from living reality. According to Dorner, the doctrine of the dogmaticians regarding inspiration not only excludes all human co-operation (which is true), but treats the holy writers as if Christianity had effected nothing in them. Dorner describes their position as violating the personality and destroying the individuality of the holy writers. Concerning their doctrine he says,2 ‘If the Holy Spirit worked in them [the amanuenses] in such a way as to render them void of individuality, if He continues to be extraneous to their person, if Christianity cannot become the possession of men without suffering an obscuration, then this same fact must also pertain to posterity in their relation to Scripture and the whole inspiration theory ultimately appears as an unworkable and idle expense.’ Whether the conclusion Dorner draws from this travesty of their doctrine is necessary is of no consequence, since he has misunderstood and misinterpreted their conception of the relation between the Spirit and the writers. To the dogmaticians it was unthinkable that God would by-pass the individuality of the sacred writers in causing Scripture to be written. Their theory of accommodation teaches that the Spirit purposely employed the individuality and natural endowments (indoles) of the writers.3 Nor did they ever imply that the Holy Spirit in the act of inspiration remained aloof from the personalities of the writers, if this is the idea Dorner wishes to convey. As for the idea imputed to them that Christianity suffers an obscuration the minute it becomes the possession of man, they would have rejected it unequivocally as militating against the perspicuity of Scripture. They were quite certain that Christianity had not been obscured in themselves. Dorner himself says elsewhere that they taught that certainty regarding the truth of Christianity was both possible and necessary.4 7. THE DOGMATICIANS AND THE HUMAN SIDE OF SCRIPTURE It has often been said that the scholastic doctrine of inspiration did away with the human side of Scripture, that it denied the necessity for self-preparation and the actuality of the writers’ human emotions and personal witness in Scripture. Cremer1 calls the doctrine of the Lutheran dogmaticians a complete innovation, lacking only ecstasy to be a renewal of the magic doctrine of Philo. He says that the dogmaticians reduce the magical theory of Philo to a mechanical one. Self-preparation of the writers is no longer necessary. Nor is there, he says, any place for personal witness in such a theory. Sasse comes to much the same conclusion.2 He finds in the monergism of the dogmaticians a Monophysite-Docetic concept of Scripture which destroyed the human character of the Bible. He explains himself by saying that this destruction took place when the holy writers were represented as tools of the Holy Spirit who wrote without the use of their will or character. At this point Sasse has gone too far; the dogmaticians never teach that the human will was inactive or neutral psychologically (materialiter & subjective), as if they experienced nothing when they wrote the Scriptures (ac si citra & contra voluntatem suam inscii ac inviti scripserint divini amanuenses).3 Sasse correctly observes that Calov taught not that the writers wrote from their own private opinions, but that what they wrote was supplied by the Spirit. But when he goes on to quote Calov’s words ‘in quibus nihil humani sit praeter organum oris’ 4 in reference to Isa. 51. 16 to support his contention that a human element in Scripture is so lacking in Calov that Scripture to him was written apart from the will of the writers, Sasse has exaggerated the true implications of Calov’s presentation. The statement by Calov referred to intends to say merely that Isaiah as a prophet spoke not his own words but the words of the Lord. The will of Isaiah is not mentioned, and there is nothing in the context to indicate that Calov thought that the Spirit of God disregarded the will of His prophet when He inspired him to write. But did not the dogmaticians ignore the human element in Scripture? According to the Lutheran dogmaticians, what was the relation, if any, between the human and the divine in Scripture? In a certain sense Calov and the other Lutheran teachers of his day held that Scripture was not human but divine: they contended that Scripture contained no human doctrine, speculation or animadversion, that human efforts and free will did not concur in bringing about Scripture in any contributory sense.1 Even the very words of Scripture were in this sense not the words of the prophets and apostles but the words of God which were communicated to the writers. This is what Calov means when he says that God put His words into the mouth of the prophet Isaiah.2 And yet this does not mean that the words in Scripture were not human words, words which expressed the feelings and desires of the writers, for God used not only the genus loquendi of the writers, but also their emotions and their whole personalities in recording His Word for the benefit of the human race. It is simply taken for granted by all the dogmaticians that the will and intellect and emotion of the holy writers were active and co-operative psychologically. They felt no need to emphasize this fact since it was accepted by everyone in their day. In such a sense, then, Scripture was a human book, containing human words and human thoughts, human aspirations and human emotions. If there was no human side to Scripture, if there was no personal mental and volitional activity on the part of the writers, inspiration would have become a mechanical operation which is enthusiasm and Montanism.3 One cannot help but feel that Sasse, like Dorner, has been so caught by the monergistic inspiration doctrine of the old dogmaticians that he has neglected to consider what is of equal importance, namely, their doctrine of accommodation. It is this failure to interpret their view of inspiration in the light of their accommodation doctrine which has resulted in a false analysis of their doctrine of inspiration itself, a false analysis which is not uncommon today. Sasse says, for instance, that to the dogmaticians everything in the Bible which pertains to the personal confession of the writers, everything which pertains to the crying out of their troubled and sin-laden souls, even their prayers as recorded in Scripture, is unreal— in the same sense as the suffering and death of Christ were unreal to the Gnostics, Marcionites and Monophysites. Thus the dogmaticians are pictured as advancing an illusionary, mechanistic concept of inspiration, a concept which they themselves were the first to denounce, with fully as much vigour as Sasse.1 This historical inaccuracy regarding the old Lutheran inspiration doctrine, as typified by Sasse, is unfortunate not only because it is believed by a large number of theologians today who should know better, but also because it really bars the way to a true understanding of the doctrine of Scripture, as taught by the dogmaticians. 8. THE DOGMATICIANS AND THE ‘DICTATION THEORY’ But do the dogmaticians not teach that the Spirit of God dictated each and every word of Scripture to the pens of His amanuenses? Is this not mechanical inspiration? It is true that they taught that the words of Scripture were written a dictatu.2 Calov says: 3 ‘The individual words of the prophets and apostles were dictated by the Holy Spirit in the same way as they are contained in Scripture.’ On the basis of hundreds of other statements like this Sasse 4 and others term the orthodox Lutheran doctrine of inspiration a ‘dictation theory.’ Such a term is certainly appropriate if it is meant to convey the thought of a monergistic suggestio verborum, but Sasse means more than this; he uses the term to connote an impersonal, mechanistic theory of inspiration. Is he justified in so doing? The dogmaticians often use the word ‘dicto’ to mean ‘dictate’ in the ordinary sense of the term. Words are simply dictated to a penman.1 At other times ‘dicto’ and ‘suggero’ are often equated.2 Gerhard,3 for instance, associates the word ‘suggero’ with the word ‘calamus’ although ‘dicto’ is ordinarily used. More often the two words, ‘dicto’ and ‘suggero,’ are used together and with the word ‘inspiro’ to denote a divine imparting or furnishing of the words of Scripture.4 In these cases the words—which are very close to being synonymous as used by the dogmaticians—complement each other and together portray the idea of inspiration in a way in which no single word could express the idea completely.5 Even more words are used to bring out the full meaning of this divine act of inspiration: influxus, afflatus, instinctus and suppeditatio. All these words go together to express the divine imparting of the words of Scripture. The best single word to express what they designate is perhaps the German ‘Eingebung.’ What is important, however, in our present discussion is the fact that neither ‘suggestio’ nor ‘dictatio’ means what its modern English derivatives imply. Both terms are best rendered by the word ‘Eingebung.’ That the troublesome word ‘dictatio’ cannot possibly have a purely mechanical connotation is also clearly seen from the fact that the dogmaticians speak of a ‘dictatio rerum.’ 1 It has already been shown that the contents of Scripture were, according to the dogmaticians, imparted to the holy writers in such a way that they understood what they were to write about. Therefore when Quenstedt says 2 that the amanuenses as instruments of the Spirit could write only what was dictated to them he does not mean that they wrote as lifeless automata who exercised no emotional or volitional activity; he means that they wrote only those words which the Holy Spirit suggested and actually imparted to them. It must not be thought that all later theologians have misconceived the old Lutheran view pertaining to the relation between the Spirit and the writers of Scripture. Koelling, Rohnert and Hoenecke have correctly understood the old orthodox Lutheran position. Pieper has thoroughly discussed it and has contributed greatly to the eradication of many false notions regarding it. Philippi, in spite of the misnomer ‘Woerterinspiration’ which he has applied to their doctrine, has correctly described the view of the dogmaticians regarding the relation of the Holy Spirit to the penmen when he remarks that they conceived of the apostles and prophets not as blind and characterless but conscious and spontaneous organs of the Holy Spirit.3 9. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE FORMULATION OF THE LUTHERAN INSPIRATION DOCTRINE The formulation of the doctrine of verbal inspiration as it was presented by the old Lutheran dogmaticians underwent a definite development which at the close of the century culminated in Calov, Quenstedt, Baier and Hollaz. Although all the old dogmaticians held the same view concerning inspiration, the later representatives of this orthodox Lutheran tradition go into the subject in much more detail. For instance, they are more explicit in teaching that the very words of Scripture were inspired, and they are quick to avoid embracing a mechanical theory of inspiration, whereas the earlier dogmaticians, while certainly not teaching such a doctrine, make less conscious an effort to reject it. This high degree of doctrinal formulation has its origin at least partly, as Kahnis has pointed out,1 in the polemical tendency of the day and in the ever-present threat of Romanism, syncretism, Socinianism, Arminianism, and mysticism. The statement of Luthardt 2 that Gerhard was the first in a developed dogmatical manner to deal with Scripture and its inspiration to the point of making it the source of theology is not in accord with historical facts. Nicholas Selnecker had dealt with the inspiration of Scripture as early as 1573 in his Institutio Christianae Religionis.3 In 1575 Heerbrand 4 had specifically considered the inspiration and divinity of Scripture in his Compendium Theologiae. In 1601 Matthias Haffenreffer published the first edition of his Loci Theologici, in which a special locus was devoted to a discussion of holy Scripture. In 1605 John Schroeder very definitely taught the verbal inspiration of Scripture and listed a large number of arguments in support of it; he said that Scripture was the source and foundation of theological doctrine.5 It is true that Gerhard’s treatment of Scripture is very original and more developed than that of any of his predecessors. He was the first to speak in much detail of inspiration, but he was not the first to deal specifically with this doctrine and give it bearing on the principle of sola scriptura. Nor can it be said that he was the father of the so-called ‘Amanuenses Theory,’ 6 although again he employed the amanuenses, notarii, tabelliones terminology more than any Lutheran theologian before him.1 The intimation of Ritschl 2 that the final development of the Lutheran teaching of verbal inspiration appeared in Gerhard’s Loci Theologici is also misleading. As a matter of fact, there was more development of the formulation of the doctrine after Gerhard than there was before and during his period of activity. The statement of Cremer, on the other hand, that Calov was the originator of the rigid scholastic doctrine of inspiration as we know it today is entirely without foundation.3 The terminology was indeed highly developed by Calov and even more so perhaps by Quenstedt, but Calov taught nothing in reference to the inspiration of the Scriptures which had not been taught by Gerhard and Hutter before him.4 Tholuck thinks that it was even after Gerhard that a dogmatic consciousness of the dogma of holy Scripture first appeared.5 He goes on correctly to point out that only after Gerhard did a doctrine of Scripture reach a conscious confessional status. Such was definitely the case with Calov’s Consensus Repetitus Fidei Vere Lutheranae. While Gerhard would most certainly have agreed with what Calov said there about Scripture, he in his day never felt any need to put the doctrine in such dogmatic form or to make it a matter of confession.