Why Read the Bible?

? Why Read the Bible? By BRYANT S. HINCKLEY President of the Liberty Stake OPENING a family Bible, an Indiana farmer found a $100.00 bank note seven- ty-five years old and still worth its face. The editor of the paper in which this was announced com- ments as follows: "Thus en- couraged I imagine a lot of people will open their Bibles once at least every seventy-five years." Not all Bibles contain bank notes but they contain other treasures. The things in this book never get old or cheap or worthless — they do not depreciate with time. The Bible is a book for think- ers. Since the dawn of the Refor- mation it has been the companion and inspiration of the leaders of mankind, the source and deposi- tory of the deepest and truest phil- osophy of life. Those who read it thoughtfully and frequently give proof of a taste for the best there is in literature and show an appreciation of the best there is in character building. It would be impossible to measure its influence upon the world. DR. William Lyon Phelps, Ph. D., Litt. D., L. L. D., Lamp- son Prof, of English literature, Yale University, in the introduc- tion to his little book, "Human Nature in the Bible," has said, with convincing clearness, some things about the good old book that every one ought to read, for an endorsement such as this from a source so eminent is indeed sig- nificant. In this book he consid- ers the Bible (referring to the Old Testament) as a work of litera- ture, "revealing the grandeur, the folly, the nobility, the baseness of human nature." He makes the declaration that the authorized version of the English Bible is the best example of English literature the world has ever seen. "It com- bines the noblest elevation of thought, aspiration, imagination, passion and religion with simplic- ity of diction." He says further: "Every one who has a thorough knowledge of the Bible may truly be called educated: and no other learning or culture, no matter how extensive or elegant, can, among Europeans and Americans, form a proper substitute. Western civ- ilization is founded upon the Bible; our ideas, our wisdom, our philosophy, our literature, our art, our ideals come more from the Bible than from all other books put together. It is revelation of divinity and of humanity; it con- tains the loftiest religious aspira- tion along with a candid repre- sentation of all that is earthly, sensual and devilish. I thoroughly believe in an university education for both men and women; but I believe a knowledge of the Bible without a college course is more valuable than a college course without the Bible. For in the Bible we have profound thought beautifully expressed; we have the nature of boys and girls, of men and women, more accurately chart- ed than in the works of any mod- ern novelist or playwright. You can learn more about human na- ture by reading the Bible than by living in New York." TN referring to the revised version he has this to say: 'The Eng- lish translation is even better than the original Hebrew and Greek. * * * I am confident that the authorized version was inspired." One might think that this gift- ed and conservative scholar had grown a little over enthusiastic in some of his statements concerning the Bible but even a superficial in- vestigation of the tremendous ef- fect it has had upon mankind gen- erally would make one hesitate to disagree with him. There are in this preface three fundamental observations: 1. That the Bible is the best literature, 2. That Western civilization was founded upon the Bible, 3. That a knowledge of the Bible is an important part of an education. ET us examine these proposi- tions in some detail, for they are important. With reference to the first "that the Bible is the best literature," careful students will scarcely question this statement. The brilliant historian and phil- osopher, John Fiske, who always equated historical values with sci- entific accuracy, is strong in his estimate of the profound influence the Bible had upon the develop- ment of the democratic idea of government in Europe and Amer- ica, and is equally strong in his praise of its literary value. Speak- ing of the men who were most in- fluential in the preservation of English freedom in the eventful days which preceded Cromwell's triumph, he says: "They found in the sacred volume the treasures of a most original and noble liter- ature unrolled before them; stir- ring history and romantic legend, cosmical theories and priestly in- junctions, profound metaphysics and pithy proverbs, psalms of un- rivalled grandeur and pastorals of exquisite loveliness, parables fraught with solemn meaning, the mournful wisdom of the preacher, the exultant faith of the apostle, the matchless eloquence of Job and Isaiah, the apocalyptic ecstasy of St. John. At a time when there was as yet no English literature for the common people, this un- told wealth of Hebrew literature was implanted in the English mind as in a virgin soil. Great consequences have flowed from the fact that the first truly popular lit- erature in England — the first which stirred the hearts of all classes of people, and filled their minds with ideal pictures and their every-day speech with apt and tell- ing phrases — was the literature comprised within the Bible. * * * It remains today, and will long remain, the noblest monument of English speech. The reason for this is obvious. The common English version of the Bible was made by men who were not aim- ing at literary effect, but simply gave natural expression to the feel- ings which for several generations have clustered around the sacred

The Improvement Era for March, 1930 321 text. They spoke with the voice of a people, which is more than the voice of the most highly gifted man. They spoke with the voice of a people to whom the Bible had come to mean all that it meant to the men who wrote it. To the Englishmen who listened to Lati- mer, to the Scotchmen who lis- tened to Knox, the Bible more than filled the place which in mod- ern times is filled by poem and essay, by novel and newspaper and scientific treatise. To its pages they went for daily instruction and comfort, with its strange Semitic names they baptized their children, upon its precepts, too often misunderstood and misap- plied, they sought to build up a rule of life that might raise them above the crude and unsatisfying world into which they were born."1 "Now as the English speaking people have the best Bible in the world, and as it is the most beau- tiful monument ever erected with the English alphabet, we ought to make the most of it, for it is an incomparably rich inheritance, free to all who can read. T~*HIS means that we ought in- 1 variably in the church and on all public occasions to use the authorized version; all others are inferior. And, except for special purposes, it should be used ex- clusively for private reading. Why make constant companions of the second best when the best is avail- able."2 To the thoughtful of mankind, the most precious possession the world has is the mission and mes- sage of the Master with the record of these as contained in the four Gospels. There is nothing in the lives of men, or the mountain heap of books, comparable to it in its influence upon the thoughts and conduct of mankind. '"TO readers of this magazine Christ was more than a man, but if his parables and discourses had come to us without any assur- ance of the divinity of their author- ship they would have been given the highest place in the precious lit- erature of the world. "What oth- er poet has joined imagination to reason in forms so perfect, with effect so simple, so powerful, so ^Beginnings of Netv England by John Fiske, p. 53-54. 2J. D. Larned, Study of Greatness in Men, p. 18. beautiful, to ends so exalted as Jesus by the parables which he taught? From what other phil- osophy of life has mankind re- ceived so much light, so much help, as from these parables and from the sayings of the Master and from his answers to the questionings of followers and foes? What other words that letters have preserved for us are so compact with mean- ing, yet so simple in their utter- ance, so straight to their purpose, so entirely without waste? * * * What a wonderful piece of litera- ture it is! Not as revelation but as literature. There is nothing so small that holds so much; nothing so unerring in thought, so full of feeling, so rich in imagination, so perfect in the beauty of simple speech." These quotations are from men who are competent to judge. Second — "that our Western civilization is built largely upon the Bible." The correctness of this is apparent to those who are familiar with the foundation of America. The impelling motive of those who made the best con- tribution to the character and de- velopment of our Republic was a religious one. The Pilgrim fath- ers came here that they might wor- ship Almighty God according to the dictates of their conscience, and while they gathered a scanty sub- sistence from the stony soil of Massachusetts they joined in wed- lock religion and culture. The offspring of that union was this great American republic. They drew their inspiration from the Bible and fashioned their lives after the precepts and principles contained in it. The Bible is the corner stone of our civilization. '"FHE third statement that "a knowledge of the Bible with- out a college course is more im- portant than a college course with- out a knowledge of the Bible" is rather a sweeping statement and may be challenged by some people. This is not an argument against education. It in no way belittles the value of a college training nor does it in any manner reflect upon its desirability or importance. It is apparent that the training of the intellect alone is not sufficient. The heart must be touched, the deeper, finer impulses of the soul must be brought out. A man was graduated from the state univer- sity and hanged in the state peni- tentiary— he lacked in moral and religious training, which are es- sentials in the development of character. Cleverness without character is dangerous. The life of the nation rests upon morality and morality rests upon religion. The first fundamental of a happy and successful life is a set- tled faith in God, a sound phil- osophy of life. We know of no other knowledge that will con- tribute more to this end, no other training that will mean so much in this direction as the training which comes from a careful study of the Bible. "CISKE, in commenting upon some of the lessons of the Bos- ton massacre, proceeds to point out that the American colonists during the trying days which preceded the Revolutionary War displayed the most unusual self-discipline, a re- spect for orderly government which was extraordinary, a politi- cal development well in advance of their time. He concludes that they were the most enlightened people upon the earth. These people read two books— the Bible and Blackstone's Commentaries — the Bible principally. Their achievements and the soundness of their characters resulted largely from their reading. Why read the Bible? If you do not like it, remember it is not on trial — the taste and cultiva- tion of the reader are on trial. This book has always been the com- panion of the best minds, the text book of the greatest intellects, the inspiration for the highest en- deavor, the source of the greatest achievement. WHY read the Bible? If not v for the depth and beauty of its literature — if not for the in- estimable contribution which it has made to our freedom and de- mocracy— if not for its great edu- cational and character building value — if for none of these rea- sons, read it because it contains the word of God, because it is the rec- ord of his dealing with his chil- dren in the dispensations that are passed and gone, indicating t1 forces that have made for right- eousness and peace and the prac- tices which have resulted in indi- vidual failure and national decay. Read it because it is a revelation of man's place in the great scheme of things and of the Almighty's plan to save and bless the world.