Quotable

Some are now making an attempt to accredit the Bible by presenting it as a book for literary study. It is said that by “a judicious selection” of its most graphic and eloquent passages it may be made a source of literary, as well as spiritual, stimulation. As expressed by one writer: “Who shall say that it is not to be included in the curriculum of polite learning as a theme, perhaps of equal moment with Shakespeare?”

This is meant to do the Bible high honour. But how could we find a more significant sign that it is ceasing to be regarded as an inspired book, unfolding to men the character and purpose of God, His mercy and grace in His Son, salvation from sin, and the terrors of judgment? Instead of being read as a book in which the voice of God is heard calling all to repentance, to obedience, and to righteousness, a voice which no man may disregard but at the peril of his soul, we are told to read it as literature—a collection of elegant extracts, of biblical masterpieces. Doubtless the purpose is by appealing to the literary taste, the imagination, the sense of the beautiful and sublime, to obtain for the Bible a new hold upon the attention of cultivated people.

But its sacred character is thus lost. It is merely a book among books—of value for intellectual culture, but no more the one book, able to make us wise unto salvation, to which we come, upon the bended knee, praying for that light from the Spirit who inspired it, without which we read in vain.

—Samuel Andrews,

Christianity and Anti-Christianity In Their Final Conflict