Part 13

In the twentieth chapter of Exodus we find the first account of the giving of the Ten Commandments. In the thirty-fourth chapter another account of the same transaction is given. These two accounts could not have been written by the same person. Read them, and you will be forced to admit that both of them cannot by any possibility be true. They differ in so many particulars, and the commandments themselves are so different, that it is impossible that both can be true.

So there are two histories of the creation. If you will read the first and second chapters of Genesis, you will find two accounts inconsistent with each other, both of which cannot be true. The first account

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ends with the third verse of the second chapter of Genesis. By the first account, man and woman were made at the same time, and made last of all. In the second account, not to be too critical, all the beasts of the field were made before Eve was, and Adam was made before the beasts of the field; whereas in the first account, God made all the animals before he made Adam. In the first account there is nothing about the rib or the bone or the side,--that is only found in the second account. In the first account, there is nothing about the Garden of Eden, nothing about the four rivers, nothing about the mist that went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground; nothing said about making man from dust; nothing about God breathing into his nostrils the breath of life; yet according to the second ac- count, the Garden of Eden was planted, and all the animals were made before Eve was formed. It is impossible to harmonize the two accounts.

So, in the first account, only the word God is used--"God said so and so,--God did so and so." In the second account he is called Lord God,--"the "Lord God formed man,"--"the Lord God caused "it to rain,"--"the Lord God planted a garden." It is now admitted that the book of Genesis is made up

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of two stories, and it is very easy to take them apart and show exactly how they were put together.

So there are two stories of the flood, differing almost entirely from each other--that is to say, so contradictory that both cannot be true.

There are two accounts of the manner in which Saul was made king, and the accounts are inconsistent with each other.

Scholars now everywhere admit that the copyists made many changes, pieced out fragments, and made additions, interpolations, and meaningless repetitions. It is now generally conceded that the speeches of Elihu, in Job, were interpolated, and most of the prophecies were made by persons whose names even are not known.

The manuscripts of the Old Testament were not alike. The Greek version differed from the Hebrew, and there was no generally received text of the Old Testament until after the beginning of the Christian era. Marks and points to denote vowels were in- vented probably in the seventh century after Christ; and whether these marks and points were put in the proper places, is still an open question. The Alex- andrian version, or what is known as the Septuagint, translated by seventy-two learned Jews assisted by

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miraculous power, about two hundred years before Christ, could not, it is now said, have been translated from the Hebrew text that we now have. This can only be accounted for by supposing that we have a different Hebrew text. The early Christians adopted the Septuagint and were satisfied for a time; but so many errors were found, and so many were scanning every word in search of something to assist their peculiar views, that new versions were produced, and the new versions all differed somewhat from the Septuagint as well as from each other. These ver- sions were mostly in Greek. The first Latin Bible was produced in Africa, and no one has ever found out which Latin manuscript was original. Many were produced, and all differed from each other. These Latin versions were compared with each other and with the Hebrew, and a new Latin version was made in the fifth century, and the old ones held their own for about four hundred years, and no one knows which version was right. Besides, there were Ethi- opie, Egyptian, Armenian and several other ver- sions, all differing from each other as well as from all others. It was not until the fourteenth century that the Bible was translated into German, and not until the fifteenth that Bibles were printed in the principal

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languages of Europe; and most of these Bibles differed from each other, and gave rise to endless disputes and to almost numberless crimes.

No man in the world is learned enough, nor has he time enough, even if he could live a thousand years, to find what books belonged to and consti- tuted the Old Testament. He could not ascertain the authors of the books, nor when they were written, nor what they mean. Until a man has sufficient time to do all this, no one can tell whether he be- lieves the Bible or not. It is sufficient, however, to say that the Old Testament is filled with contradic- tions as to the number of men slain in battle, as to the number of years certain kings reigned, as to the number of a woman's children, as to dates of events, and as to locations of towns and cities.

Besides all this, many of its laws are contradictory, often commanding and prohibiting the same thing.

The New Testament also is filled with contradic- tions. The gospels do not even agree upon the terms of salvation. They do not even agree as to the gospel of Christ, as to the mission of Christ. They do not tell the same story regarding the be- trayal, the crucifixion, the resurrection or the ascen- sion of Christ. John is the only one that ever heard

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of being "born again." The evangelists do not give the same account of the same miracles, and the miracles are not given in the same order. They do not agree even in the genealogy of Christ.

_Fourth_. Is the Bible scientific? In my judgment it is not

It is unscientific to say that this world was "cre- "ated that the universe was produced by an infinite being, who had existed an eternity prior to such "creation." My mind is such that I cannot possibly conceive of a "creation." Neither can I conceive of an infinite being who dwelt in infinite space an infi- nite length of time.

I do not think it is scientific to say that the uni- verse was made in six days, or that this world is only about six thousand years old, or that man has only been upon the earth for about six thousand years.

If the Bible is true, Adam was the first man. The age of Adam is given, the age of his children, and the time, according to the Bible, was kept and known from Adam, so that if the Bible is true, man has only been in this world about six thousand years. In my judgment, and in the judgment of every scientific man whose judgment is worth having or quoting, man inhabited this earth for thousands of ages prior

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to the creation of Adam. On one point the Bible is at least certain, and that is, as to the life of Adam. The genealogy is given, the pedigree is there, and it is impossible to escape the conclusion that, according to the Bible, man has only been upon this earth about six thousand years. There is no chance there to say "long periods of time," or "geological ages." There we have the years. And as to the time of the creation of man, the Bible does not tell the truth.

What is generally called "The Fall of Man" is unscientific. God could not have made a moral character for Adam. Even admitting the rest of the story to be true, Adam certainly had to make char- acter for himself.

The idea that there never would have been any disease or death in this world had it not been for the eating of the forbidden fruit is preposterously unsci- entific. Admitting that Adam was made only six thousand years ago, death was in the world millions of years before that time. The old rocks are filled with re- mains of what were once living and breathing animals. Continents were built up with the petrified corpses of animals. We know, therefore, that death did not enter the world because of Adam's sin. We know that life and death are but successive links in an eternal chain.

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So it is unscientific to say that thorns and brambles were produced by Adam's sin.

It is also unscientific to say that labor was pro- nounced as a curse upon man. Labor is not a curse. Labor is a blessing. Idleness is a curse.

It is unscientific to say that the sons of God, living, we suppose, in heaven, fell in love with the daughters of men, and that on account of this a flood was sent upon the earth that covered the highest mountains.

The whole story of the flood is unscientific, and no scientific man worthy of the name, believes it.

Neither is the story of the tower of Babel a scien- tific thing. Does any scientific man believe that God confounded the language of men for fear they would succeed in building a tower high enough to reach to heaven?

It is not scientific to say that angels were in the habit of walking about the earth, eating veal dressed with butter and milk, and making bargains about the destruction of cities.

The story of Lot's wife having been turned into a pillar of salt is extremely unscientific.

It is unscientific to say that people at one time lived to be nearly a thousand years of age. The history

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of the world shows that human life is lengthening instead of shortening.

It is unscientific to say that the infinite God wrestled with Jacob and got the better of him, put- ting his thigh out of joint.

It is unscientific to say that God, in the likeness of a flame of fire, inhabited a bush.

It is unscientific to say that a stick could be changed into a living snake. Living snakes can not be made out of sticks. There are not the necessary elements in a stick to make a snake.

It is not scientific to say that God changed water into blood. All the elements of blood are not in water.

It is unscientific to declare that dust was changed into lice.

It is not scientific to say that God caused a thick darkness over the land of Egypt, and yet allowed it to be light in the houses of the Jews.

It is not scientific to say that about seventy people could, in two hundred and fifteen years increase to three millions.

It is not scientific to say that an infinitely good God would destroy innocent people to get revenge upon a king.

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It is not scientific to say that slavery was once right, that polygamy was once a virtue, and that ex- termination was mercy.

It is not scientific to assert that a being of infinite power and goodness went into partnership with in- sects,--granted letters of marque and reprisal to hornets.

It is unscientific to insist that bread was really rained from heaven.

It is not scientific to suppose that an infinite being spent forty days and nights furnishing Moses with plans and specifications for a tabernacle, an ark, a mercy seat, cherubs of gold, a table, four rings, some dishes, some spoons, one candlestick, several bowls, a few knobs, seven lamps, some snuffers, a pair of tongs, some cur- tains, a roof for a tent of rams' skins dyed red, a few boards, an altar with horns, ash pans, basins and flesh hooks, shovels and pots and sockets of silver and ouches of gold and pins of brass--for all of which this God brought with him patterns from heaven.

It is not scientific to say that when a man commits a sin, he can settle with God by killing a sheep.

It is not scientific to say that a priest, by laying his hands on the head of a goat, can transfer the sins of a people to the animal.

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Was it scientific to endeavor to ascertain whether a woman was virtuous or not, by compelling her to drink water mixed with dirt from the floor of the sanctuary?

Is it scientific to say that a dry stick budded, blossomed, and bore almonds; or that the ashes of a red heifer mixed with water can cleanse us of sin; or that a good being gave cities into the hands of the Jews in consideration of their murdering all the in- habitants?

Is it scientific to say that an animal saw an angel, and conversed with a man?

Is it scientific to imagine that thrusting a spear through the body of a woman ever stayed a plague?

Is it scientific to say that a river cut itself in two and allowed the lower end to run off?

Is it scientific to assert that seven priests blew seven rams' horns loud enough to blow down the walls of a city?

Is it scientific to say that the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down for about a whole day, and that the moon also stayed?

Is it scientifically probable that an angel of the Lord devoured unleavened cakes and broth with fire that came out of the end of a stick, as he sat

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under an oak tree; or that God made known his will by letting dew fall on wool without wetting the ground around it; or that an angel of God appeared to Manoah in the absence of her husband, and that this angel afterwards went up in a flame of fire, and as the result of this visit a child was born whose strength was in his hair?

Is it scientific to say that the muscle of a man de- pended upon the length of his locks?

Is it unscientific to deny that water gushed from a hollow place in a dry bone?

Is it evidence of a thoroughly scientific mind to believe that one man turned over a house so large that three thousand people were on its roof?

Is it purely scientific to say that a man was once fed by the birds of the air, who brought him bread and meat every morning and evening, and that after- ward an angel turned cook and prepared two sup- pers in one night, for the same prophet, who ate enough to last him forty days and forty nights?

Is it scientific to say that a river divided because the water had been struck with a cloak; or that a man actually went to heaven in a chariot of fire drawn by horses of fire; or that a being of infinite mercy would destroy children for laughing at a bald-

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headed prophet; or curse children and childrens children with leprosy for a father's fault; or that he made iron float in water; or that when one corpse touched another it came to life; or that the sun went backward in heaven so that the shadow on a sun- dial went back ten degrees, as a sign that a miserable barbarian king would get well?

Is it scientific to say that the earth not only stopped in its rotary motion, but absolutely turned the other way,--that its motion was reversed simply as a sign to a petty king?

Is it scientific to say that Solomon made gold and silver at Jerusalem as plentiful as stones, when we know that there were kings in his day who could have thrown away the value of the whole of Palestine without missing the amount?

Is it scientific to say that Solomon exceeded all the kings of the earth in glory, when his country was barren, without roads, when his people were few, without commerce, without the arts, without the sciences, without education, without luxuries?

According to the Bible, as long as Jehovah attended to the affairs of the Jews, they had nothing but war, pestilence and famine; after Jehovah abandoned them, and the Christians ceased, in a measure, to persecute

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them, the Jews became the most prosperous of people. Since Jehovah in his anger cast them away, they have produced painters, sculptors, scientists, statesmen, composers, soldiers and philosophers.

It is not scientific to believe that God ever pre- vented rain, that he ever caused famine, that he ever sent locusts to devour the wheat and corn, that he ever relied on pestilence for the government of man- kind; or that he ever killed children to get even with their parents.

It is not scientific to believe that the king of Egypt invaded Palestine with seventy thousand horsemen and twelve hundred chariots of war. There was not, at that time, a road in Palestine over which a chariot could be driven.

It is not scientific to believe that in a battle between Jeroboam and Abijah, the army of Abijah slew in one day five hundred thousand chosen men.

It is not scientific to believe that Zerah, the Ethio- pian, invaded Palestine with a million of men who were overthrown and destroyed; or that Jehoshaphat had a standing army of nine hundred and sixty thousand men.

It is unscientific to believe that Jehovah advertised for a liar, as is related in Second Chronicles.

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It is not scientific to believe that fire refused to burn, or that water refused to wet.

It is not scientific to believe in dreams, in visions, and in miracles.

It is not scientific to believe that children have been born without fathers, that the dead have ever been raised to life, or that people have bodily as- cended to heaven taking their clothes with them.

It is not scientific to believe in the supernatural. Science dwells in the realm of fact, in the realm of demonstration. Science depends upon human ex- perience, upon observation, upon reason.

It is unscientific to say that an innocent man can be punished in place of a criminal, and for a criminal, and that the criminal, on account of such punishment, can be justified.

It is unscientific to say that a finite sin deserves infinite punishment.

It is unscientific to believe that devils can inhabit human beings, or that they can take possession of swine, or that the devil could bodily take a man, or the Son of God, and carry him to the pinnacle of a temple.

In short, the foolish, the unreasonable, the false, the miraculous and the supernatural are unscientific.

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_Question_. Mr. Talmage gives his reason for accepting the New Testament, and says: "You "can trace it right out. Jerome and Eusebius in the "first century, and Origen in the second century, "gave lists of the writers of the New Testament. "These lists correspond with our list of the writers "of the New Testament, showing that precisely as "we have it, they had it in the third and fourth cen- "turies. Where did they get it? From Irenæus. "Where did he get it? From Polycarp. Where did "Polycarp get it? From Saint John, who was a per- "sonal associate of Jesus. The line is just as clear "as anything ever was clear." How do you under- stand this matter, and has Mr. Talmage stated the facts?

_Answer_. Let us examine first the witnesses pro- duced by Mr. Talmage. We will also call attention to the great principle laid down by Mr. Talmage for the examination of evidence,--that where a witness is found false in one particular, his entire testimony must be thrown away.

Eusebius was born somewhere about two hundred and seventy years after Christ. After many vicissi- tudes he became, it is said, the friend of Constantine. He made an oration in which he extolled the virtues

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of this murderer, and had the honor of sitting at the right hand of the man who had shed the blood of his wife and son. In the great controversy with regard to the position that Christ should occupy in the Trinity, he sided with Arius, "and lent himself to the perse- "cution of the orthodox with Athanasius." He in- sisted that Jesus Christ was not the same as God, and that he was not of equal power and glory. Will Mr. Talmage admit that his witness told the truth in this? "He would not even call the Son co-eternal "with God."

Eusebius must have been an exceedingly truthful man. He declared that the tracks of Pharaoh's chariots were in his day visible upon the shores of the Red Sea; that these tracks had been through all the years miraculously preserved from the action of wind and wave, as a supernatural testimony to the fact that God miraculously overwhelmed Pharaoh and his hosts.

Eusebius also relates that when Joseph and Mary arrived in Eygpt they took up their abode in Hermopolis,

a city of Thebæus, in which was the superb temple of Serapis. When Joseph and Mary entered the temple, not only the great idol, but all the lesser idols fell down before him.

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"It is believed by the learned Dr. Lardner, that "Eusebius was the one guilty of the forgery in the "passage found in Josephus concerning Christ. Un- "blushing falsehoods and literary forgeries of the "vilest character darkened the pages of his historical "writings." (Waites History.)

From the same authority I learn that Eusebius invented an eclipse, and some earthquakes, to agree with the account of the crucifixion. It is also be- lieved that Eusebius quoted from works that never existed, and that he pretended a work had been written by Porphyry, entitled: "The Philosophy of "Oracles," and then quoted from it for the purpose of proving the truth of the Christian religion.

The fact is, Eusebius was utterly destitute of truth. He believed, as many still believe, that he could please God by the fabrication of lies.

Irenæus lived somewhere about the end of the second century. "Very little is known of his early "history, and the accounts given in various biogra- "phies are for the most part conjectural." The writings of Irenæus are known to us principally through Eusebius, and we know the value of his testimony.

Now, if we are to take the testimony of Irenæus,

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why not take it? He says that the ministry of Christ lasted for twenty years, and that Christ was fifty years old at the time of his crucifixion. He also insisted that the "Gospel of Paul" was written by Luke, "a "statement made to give sanction to the gospel of "Luke."

Irenæus insisted that there were four gospels, that there must be, and "he speaks frequently of these "gospels, and argues that they should be four in "number, neither more nor less, because there are "four universal winds, and four quarters of the "world;" and he might have added: because donkeys have four legs.

These facts can be found in "The History of the "Christian Religion to A. D. 200," by Charles B. Waite,--a book that Mr. Talmage ought to read.

According to Mr. Waite, Irenæus, in the thirty- third chapter of his fifth book, _Adversus Hæreses_, cites from Papias the following sayings of Christ: "The days will come in which vines shall grow "which shall have ten thousand branches, and on "each branch ten thousand twigs, and in each twig "ten thousand shoots, and in each shoot ten thousand "clusters, and in every one of the clusters ten "thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed

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"will give five and twenty metrets of wine." Also that "one thousand million pounds of clear, pure, fine "flour will be produced from one grain of wheat." Irenæus adds that "these things were borne witness "to by Papias the hearer of John and the companion "of Polycarp."

Is it possible that the eternal welfare of a human being depends upon believing the testimony of Poly- carp and Irenæus? Are people to be saved or lost on the reputation of Eusebius? Suppose a man is firmly convinced that Polycarp knew nothing about Saint John, and that Saint John knew nothing about Christ,--what then? Suppose he is convinced that Eusebius is utterly unworthy of credit,--what then? Must a man believe statements that he has every reason to think are false?

The question arises as to the witnesses named by Mr. Talmage, whether they were competent to decide as to the truth or falsehood of the gospels. We have the right to inquire into their mental traits for the purpose of giving only due weight to what they have said.

Mr. Bronson C. Keeler is the author of a book called: "A Short History of the Bible." I avail myself of a few of the facts he has there collected. I

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