The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1915-12-07
Cheapeni1g the Bible

.CTUDY of the Bible ought to be getting great
~ lift these days. The cry of Back to the
Bible" has been needed by an extraordinary num-
Der OF statesmen and newspapers and street cor,
ner debaters. EX-presidents and presidents, Bry-
an and ant-Bryanites, are hurting texts at each
other, and congressman and editors are search
ing the Scriptures il happy they may find form
of words which they can wrest, not to their own
damnation, but to that OF some political opponent.
If the thing goes much longer, an essential
part of preparedness" Will be the arning Of every
dsputant in Biblical panoply. And it needs to
go no further whatever to reinforce the old sneer
about the Bible:
"This is the book where each his doctrine seeks,
And this the book where each his doctrine finds. ;"
The result not but be feared to be by rever-
ent minds Cheapening and even degrading Of
the Bible. Once it is regarded as an armory of
political weapons, its sacred place apart will be,
impered. 1t certainly is not edifying to see
men reaching for text as they might for dag
ger And when the process has become estat-
lShed of matching Scrptural citation against cita-
ton, of seeing which antagonist score the
most points" in that way, we shall have taken
long step toward justfying Frederick D. Mau-
rice's bitter complaint that the Bible had been
made great betting book" in which the true
odds" to be looked for .
Whatever the Bible is, it is not political
manual. Not even for its times did it under,
take to lay down for rulers anything but the spirit
in which they should act, the principles of moral
ity and the motives of religion which they should
embody. And the effort to make it fit every polit-
zeal movement, every supposed exigency, of our
day is simply grotesque. 1t does not help any
mans in the least who so endeavors to
enlist the Bible on his side, and it hurts the Bible
in public esteem. 'Why" men say, YOU can
prove anything you please out of the Bible, ac-
cording to that" And SO you can
hat all these attempts to use the Bible as
political mis- lie are really gross misuse of it. Is
clear to any one who has even a slight knowl-
edge of the achievements Of Biblical research
during the past fifty years. The result has been
to arrive at better understanding of 'the true
place of the Bible as respects science for exam
Pile, or government. Time was when geology was
dangerous heresy, because in apparent Conflict
with heneSis, and astronomers were the enemies
OF relgion But the wiser interpreters of the Bible
long since came round to the view that it was not
designated to teach how the earth was made. but
how to make it better place for human beings :;
not how the heavens go, but how to 60 to heaven
And IN It's contacts with secular rule it necessarily
took the color of its time. When Israel might at
any moment be attacked without warning by As
syrian or PhlliStlne it was natural enough for
prophet to speak OF the need of Waterman yiei-
liant to report the approach of the sword. But TO
seek to transfer those conditions into the modern
world and gravely to cite Biblical authority for
military bill which the administration is pre-
parlng to submit to congress, is more than ridicu
I"uS. 1t is an affront to the intelligence As well
60 10 the other extreme, and urge congress to
husband the army and blow up the navy because