of the all-pervading, and uses it as a convenient object for purposes of concentration.* Then he extemporaneously told how a Christian missionary had provoked the wrath of his people, instead of converting them. In condemnation of idolatry the missionary said, “I can strike against your god, and he cannot hurt me." A heathen in the congregation replied, "So I can do things against your God, and he cannot hurt me." The missionary replied, "Yes, he can, and will when you die." The heathen thereupon added, "So will my god hurt you when you die." Both "believed in the existence of a spiritual principle." Again, Dr. George F. Pentecost, of London, in his address on "The Invincible Gospel," censured the oriental religionists for their criticisms of Christianity, and said that the abuses in American cities pointed out by these men were outside the pale of Christianity. He furthermore declared: In India among the high caste Brahmans there are at least six hundred priestesses, and every one of these is a prostitute. They are prostitutes because they are priestesses, and they are priestesses because they are prostitutes.t The next day Virchand A. Gandhi, a Hindu, in a paper entitled "The History and Tenets of the Jains of India," said : Abuses are not arguments against any religion. . . . There are a few Hindu temples in Southern India where women singers are employed to sing on certain occasions. Some of them are of dubious character, and the Hindu society feels it and is trying its best to remove the evil. But to call these "priestesses because they are prostitutes " and "prostitutes because they are priestesses" is a statement that differs as much from the truth as darkness from light. These women are never allowed to enter the main body of the temple; and, as for their being priestesses, there is not one woman priest from the Himalayas to Cape Comorin.‡ A Brahman monk, Vivekananda by name, a great favorite at the Parliament on account of his candid manner and tolerant spirit, in reply to our conviction that the funeral pyre was a natural product of their religion, said: The Hindus have their own faults; . . . but, mark this, it is always toward punishing their own bodies, and never to cut the throats of their neighbors. If the Hindu fanatic burns himself on the pyre he never lights the fire of inquisition; and even this cannot be laid at the door of * The World's Parliament of Religions, vol. 1, p. 327. Ibid., Sept. 26, 1893. religion, any more than the burning of witches can be laid at the door of Christianity.* They further declared that we have too long been contrasting their most degraded classes with the best products of our civilization—a procedure as unjust as for them to describe our civilization by what can be seen in the slums of Chicago. III. While these orientals showed themselves intolerant of attacks inspired by prejudice or ignorance, they were extremely tolerant of Christian wisdom, reason, and righteousness. The delegates of the Brahmo-somaj did not hesitate to say that they regarded Jesus as "the greatest religious teacher the world has ever known." B. B. Nagarkar, of Bombay, is a Hindu reformer trying to ingraft certain Christian principles into the old Hindu stock. He said: The conquest of India by England is one of the most astounding marvels of modern history. The victory of the British, if victory ... it can be called, was mainly due to the internal quarrels and dissensions that had been going on for ages. . . It was a state of complete anarchy; and no one could fathom what was to come out of this universal chaos. At this critical juncture of time there appeared on the scene a distant power from beyond the ocean. No one had heard or known anything of it. In those days a white-faced, biped animal was synonymous with a representative of the race of monkeys. . . . It was no earthly power that transferred the supreme sovereignty of Hindustan into the hands of Great Britain. . . . Their deep wailing and lamentation had pierced the heavens, and the Lord of love and mercy was moved with compassion for them.t In this revolution he discovered for India the blessings of "a divine providence" and said, "I think of Christ, the great Teacher of Nazareth, as a king of prophets." The Rev. Dr. H. H. Jessup, of Beirut, Syria, also, declared that there is a "vast reform party of Persian Moslems who accept the New Testament as the word of God and Christ as the deliverer of men, who regard all nations as one and all men as brothers." § And H. Dharmapala, a Buddhist of Ceylon, said, "Yes, friends, if you are serious, if you are unselfish, if you are altruistic, this program can be carried out, and the twentieth century will see the teachings of the meek and lowly Jesus accomplished." I *The World's Parliament of Religions, vol. ii, pp. 976, 977. ↑ Ibid., vol. 1, pp. 767, 768. The Daily Inter Ocean, Chicago, Sept. 17, 1893. The World's Parliament of Religions, vol. 11, pp. 1125, 1126. Ibid., vol. i, p. 96. IV. The Parliament strongly emphasized the fact that “men must be converted by their veneration, and not by their doubts." Christianity will advance among the heathen, not merely by developing skepticism with reference to their own doctrines, but by showing how the truth they already have is the forerunner of the truth that Jesus has come to proclaim. Mere disproof only drives the specter of superstition out of the house; but it is ready to return to its old lodging as soon as the memory of the disproof is forgotten. The victim of superstition must be made not only to conform to the teachings of Christ, but must be transformed by the renewing of his mind, the regeneration of his heart, and the divine inspiration in his life. We must oppose idolatry; but our opposition should show, not personal animosity, but divine authority. For many years the intelligence of Athens had hurled invectives against the idolatries of the city. Socrates and Menander did not hesitate to condemn the superstitions that enslaved the people. Yet these superstitions remained. "But," as James Martineau puts it, "when Paul, without a sneer, even taking a text from a pagan altar, revealed to them the unknown God and preached Jesus and the resurrection, the doom of the whole Pantheon went forth upon his voice." In presence of the Parliament of Religions it seemed as if the spirit of Justin Martyr was again with the Church to revive his teaching of "the omnipresent Logos"-"the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." It seemed, also, as though Jesus said, with renewed emphasis, "Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd." And to the devout Jew Jesus again seemed to say, "Thou ar not far from the kingdom of God." Professor Minas Tcheraz, delegate from the Armenian Church, declared that Christianity had brought about a revolution in the ideas of the Armenian people and had pushed them forward in the way of instruction.* And Herant Mesrob Kiretchjian, of Constantinople, described the Parliament as a Beulah land of prophecy which should send forth the echo of that sweet song, once heard in Eastern lands, "On earth peace, good will toward men." By way of this Parliament it seemed as though *The World's Parliament of Religions, vol. ii, p. 929. all religions had come to the golden gate of the twentieth century; and, in obedience to the one God, all prayed, “Our Father which art in heaven," and, with the inspiration of Him who enlightens every man, all sang, "Nearer, my God, to thee." Certain it is that to-day there is majesty and force in the Gospel as never in the past. It has now a Christian civilization behind it such as the early Church did not enjoy. It is henceforth to be revealed, not in words only, in epistles, in sermons, in creeds, but also in arts, in sciences, in governments, in institutions of learning and of charity, in Christian churches and Christian homes, in refinements and in culture, in material prosperity and in national glory. These features of our civilization amazed the visitors from the East. They could not account for it, but witnessed it until it seemed like an enchantment. The enthusiasm of our people for liberty, for education, and for popular advancement was to them a constant astonishment. Was Jesus the genius that had turned our coal into power and our iron ore into steel, that had made the electric fluid our servant by day and by night, that had given a railroad to every city and a steam engine to every factory? At first they thought that our civilization was purely and only material; but they learned that beneath all and through all there breathed a spiritual life whose inspiration was none other than the Christ. In these auspicious times it is our privilege to do greater works than have been accomplished in all the past. A goal is before us that cannot be attained by singing hymns, by partaking of the sacraments, or by the ecstatic uplift of prayer. But if we will be the successors of the apostles, not only in time, but in spirit, will, like them, count it a privilege to sacrifice, to suffer, and to endure as seeing him who is invisible, and will now go and "preach the Gospel to every creature," we shall see Jesus entering into his heathen inheritance and taking possession of the uttermost parts of the earth. H.R.Bender ART. VI.-PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY. THEOLOGY is the science of God. It is a human science, though it deals with divine being and supernatural things. Its concepts are not inspired. They may be based upon inspired revelation, but as parts of a formulated system are not themselves of inspired origin. Man does not create the facts on which any science is based. The stars and their laws afford the basis of astronomy. Matter, in its constitution and affinities, furnishes the facts on which the science of chemistry rests. Progress in these sciences does not involve any change in the laws which govern the stars, or any alteration in the methods of chemical action. Is theology a progressive science, or is it a science which is complete and unimprovable? If progressive, it does not involve change in the truths on which it is based. Theology is not to be defined in strict accordance with its etymology. It contains more than the simple doctrine of God. It has been called "the science of the unfolded, objective self-manifestation of the divine Spirit in the phenomenal kingdom, a practical science which develops progressively and side by side with that kingdom." It is divided into natural theology, which includes those manifestations of himself which God has made in the physical universe, and revealed theology, which relates to those disclosures of himself which God has made in written or spoken word. Evidently the field is wide upon which the student enters when he begins the study of theology, too wide a field to say that in it there is no progress, no higher step succeeding lower. Ideas grow, both in men's conception of them and in their apparent relations to each other. They may not, at the first pres entation, appear in their just proportions. We often see, in the beginning, but the adumbration of an idea. The idea itself is hidden and comes into view later. There is more in any idea set forth in the Scripture than appears in the particular presentation of it which is attempted. Without doubt truth is something which has exact dimensions. Man's failure to comprehend it is due to his finiteness, and not to any lack of definiteness in the truth itself. A mind broad enough can go round the truth and view every aspect and angle of it. It is not a 60-FIFTH SERIES, VOL. XI. |