Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1910-01-08
For Sunday Reading
III Sorts efOpiniiens

FOR Sunday Reading
oil Sorts of Opinions
Believe Ye the Miracles?
Especially Contributed to this column
by An Eminent Iowa Divine and
Educator]
If miracles are incredible, what then?
Until recently those who disbelieved
the gospel spoke OF them as we speak
of Munchausen's stories and as Peary
speaks of Cooks report as to his dis
covery of the north pole. Today some
men in theological professorships and
some pulpit leaders in orthodox"
churches doubt or deny large portions
of the gospels, and yet call the Christ
disclosed in them their Master. They
claim, on the basis of those writings,
that Jesus was very wonderful man,
and yet pronounce the miracles re-
ported there utterly incredible. They
tell us that Mark learned his gospel
from Peter but that Peters enthusi-
asm probably distorted some facts in
the life of Jesus and that Mark may
have misunderstood him, and, in his
glowing love of his Master, may have
exaggerated the report of what Peter
had already magnifed. Then came
Matthew and Luke, who copied much
from the exaggerations of Mark, and
then incorporated much more in their
reports which the common speech of
the disciples concerning their departed
Lord had enlarged into further fiction.
Men tell US that the gospel of
John is book of pious and glowing
meditations of Thomas A. Kempis, or
full. precious and inspiring, like the
meditations of Thomas A. Kempris, or
Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress, or Uncle
Toms Cabin. but not history, that some
other John and not John the apostle,
was it's author.
They declare the miracles in these
gospels incredible, and yet think they
believe that God is so Imminent in
nature that He Himself, and not the
laws of nature. shapes every event in
human life and is the direct architect
of every spear of grass.
But the account of miracles consti-
/, tutes large part of every one of the
gospels. We should suppose that any
one who disbelieves these accounts of
what Jesus did would find it easy to
disbelieve what the evangelists declare
He said. And this supposition has been
realized, as at the meeting of the Ma
1 tional congregational Council at Cleve-
land in 1907, when Prof. a. w Vernon,
of Yale Theological Seminary said:
! We can not be sure of precisely what
they (the words of jesus were"
The gospels are. confessedly the best
I evidence of what Jesus did and said,
! and if we can not believe these on
these points. what can we know. or
even think we know, of Jesus himself?
| DR.. George A. Gordon, of the old South
church, Boston, shrewd, beautiful and
often inspiring writer on religious
/ themes. has just published a volume
on Religion and Miracle" in which
he labors to prove what few will deny.
that neither miracle nor belief in it is
essential to religion. but he does not
i tell us what becomes of the credibility
of the gospels if their accounts of the
birth, the deeds most Impressive to on
! lockers. and of the resurrection are
successfully irpeached. Neither he nor
anyone of US would give second seri-
Gus thought 10 any volume of biogra-
ply which offers. not only now and
then, a fiction as fact. but which is
filled as largely with falsehood as the
gospels are filled with miracles
The vital question today is not so
much whether the early christians be-
lieved in miracles or the influence of
that belief on the early success of
christianity in the world, not so much
\ whether he aunStIeS really baIiaved
what they said they saw and heard,
and then died unflinchingly because
they said it, as it is whether we can
have any confidence in single SEN
tence of the evangelists if they told so
much that was purely imaginary or de-
liberately false. If any other writer's
made such a liberal use of fiction as
fact, we would believe nothing else
simply because they said it. Such wit
nesses in court would be utterly dis
credited, and would be in danger of
a states prison sentence for perjury.
Let such disbelief in the sterling
veracity of the historians of Jesus life
prevail, reaonable men will place them
in the category of the worlds monu-
mental faisifiers. If they should tell
a truth occasionally it would raise a
question with the thoughtful critics
whether the truth was not uninten-
tional.
Infidels today who would impeach the
credibility of the gospels need not try
TO be original They can limit them
selves to quotations from theological
se,ninaries and eminent preachers.
A MOSSBACK.